City Council - Regular Meeting

All right, good evening everyone. It is Thursday, October 8th. This is a meeting of the Somerville City Council. I'm calling this meeting to order. My name is Lance Davis presiding. I use he, him pronouns. Note that video and audio recording of this meeting is being recorded and may be shown live on local government access channels and the City of Somerville website and will be made available for future review. Will the clerk please call the roll?

All right, thank you. Pursuant to our Rule 32, 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 councillors wishing to say a few words in remembrance of anyone this evening? Councillor McLaughlin.

Thank you, Mr. President. I'd like to remember Teresa Hussey of Rush Street, lifelong Somerville resident, multi-generation Somerville resident, former employee of the city of Somerville, just all around great person, mother, grandmother. I went to high school with her son, played football with him. Her daughter also served in the military in the U.S. Army, and she's very proud of her grandson that she helped raise as well. Just a really great person, very genuine person, very honest and direct. And took a lot of pride in her work I put it place orders as a counselor all the time and she'd see

Thank you for my colleague from Ward 1 for bringing this moment. I Teresa Ozzie was an incredible individual, very well known in Somerville, but for anybody who didn't know her, really just exemplified the strength that I associate with Somerville. She's one of the few people I know to sue the city twice and win while working for the city. When I talk about how nobody knows their blocks better than the people who live on it, I'm talking about Teresa Hussey. When I talk about the generational knowledge that we lose out of water and sewer when the people have been working on it for so long go aw

Let's have that one come from the entire council, unless there's any objection. Any others?

Councilor Clayton? Mr. President, thank you. This evening I ask that we hold a moment of silence in memory of Keith Michael Mannix, who passed away suddenly at the age of 49 shortly after relocating to Colorado. Keith was raised here in Somerville. He graduated Somerville High School and played hockey for the Highlanders. He had a lasting impact on everybody who had the privilege of knowing him. Keith was the kind of person you could always count on, generous, fiercely loyal, and always ready to lend a helping hand. He was the ultimate go-to guy. He also had a great sense of humor, loved havin

Thank you. Any others? All right, would everyone in the chamber please rise, however you are able, for a moment of silence. Thank you. madam clerk next item agenda item 1.3 approval of the minutes of the regular meeting of august 27th 2026. seeing no discussion that item is approved next councilman campen would like to take up items 2.1 2.3 and 2.2 together and then along with along with those items also together out of order item 4.9 and 7.10 any objection all right seeing no objection we'll waive the rules and take up those five items together madam clerk would you read those in please

We have a quorum present. So Madam Clerk, items 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, and 4.9 are approved. And 7.10 is placed on file. And I should note that we are served tonight by our Assistant City Clerk, Madeline Talia, because Clerk Henderson is receiving an award, the Catalyst for Democracy Award for Mass Vote. So she is a very excellent excuse to miss the meeting tonight. So we congratulate her on that. All right, the next item out of order, let's go to item 4.15, 4.15, that's okay. If there's no objection, we'll waive the rules and take up item 4.15 out of order.

Rather than stepping down and talking about this myself, I'll defer to my co-sponsor, Councilor Ewan Campin.

Thank you, Councillor Young-Kampen. Councillor Young-Kampen would like to sponsor David Gibbs. Seeing no objection, Mr. Gibbs, please approach. Thank you all.

I think the whole council would like to sign on. Any discussion? Okay, thank you, Mr. Gibbs. So that item is approved, and now Councillor Hart would like to request to waive the rules to take item 4.13 out of order. Seeing no objection, Madam Clerk, would you read 4.13?

Thank you so much. Clerk, would you mind reading it into the record?

Thank you so much. So as the resolution said, this year we've seen the highest level nationally of people being detained by ICE and being held in ICE detention. And unfortunately, in August, we reached the highest level ever recorded of people being detained by ICE. Even though what the administration is doing, what DHS is doing through ICE, is really this campaign of terror, even though it's not making front-page news all the time anymore, it is still happening and the levels are increasing. I feel so grateful that we live in a city and a state where so much work has been done. All of the wel

Counselor Hart would like to sponsor Ms. LaSalle to speak. I see no objection. Please step forward.

Councillor Scott would like to sign on, Councillor Link, I think the whole council would like to sign on. Any discussion? Councillor Wheeler?

Sorry, didn't go on. I want to recognize first that the climate that we're in is infuriating, deeply painful, and deeply unjust. No one should have to live in fear. And in all the complexities of our normal criminal justice system, people should not bear the added burden of being found not guilty and released, or released after serving their assigned time, just to additionally face arrest and possible deportation by the government. This year, there was work at the State House on passing the Protect Act, and I'm deeply grateful for the Protect Act and its protections, however partial, and deepl

Thank you Thank you that item is approved and Madam Clerk, let's go back to the regular order before we take up any additional out-of-order items and do our public hearings and grants applications, please.

I now declare this public hearing to be open. Is there anyone here to speak on the item? Dave Flewellen, online. Give us a minute to get all the unmuting done. There you go. Mr. Flan, go right ahead. Okay, thank you. Is there anyone else here to speak on the item? If you're online, you can use the raise hand function at the bottom of your screen. Not seeing anyone? All right, then I declare the public hearing closed. Any questions or discussion? Council Link?

Thank you, Mr. President. So I was taking a quick look at some of these, and I noticed this one stood out to me because It looks like the work that's going to happen where they're going to be cutting is on the schematic, it doesn't show it, but there is actually a curb cut for a crosswalk right there. So I'm just curious if that's been taken into account, the fact that we need to have a a curb cut fixed and all the work that that might entail.

Mr. Fleming, can you speak to how the work will interface with the curb cut?

Just by restored back to condition means that it'll be cement again or that it's gonna be cement with Asphalt Trip hazard right in the middle

and then we will return to replace the concrete mr this if you can just tell me one more time how how long will it be a mr can you speak a little bit just to the the required process of that sort of two-step replacement

Yes Like is it gonna be a patch for a week a month a year?

Thank you, Mr. President. I want to thank my colleague at large for flagging this. I believe this is part of a crosswalk, which is a route to school for the kids going to the Healy School. So I really would urge the utility to take swift action in making sure we restore this 100% as our kids do rely on that crosswalk to get to school. Thank you.

Thank you. Any further discussion? All right, seeing none, then this item is approved. Next item.

Mr. Chair. Councilor Scott. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm going to be recused from this one as I appear on the list of abutters on page seven. All right, very good. Councilor Scott is recused.

All right, I now declare the public hearing to be open. Is there anyone here to speak on the item? We have Michael Katz online.

Okay, thank you. Is there anyone else to speak on the item? Anyone from Eversource by any chance? Is there anyone from Eversource here to speak on this item? Councilor Young-Kampen, did you want to speak? Okay. Okay, hearing none, then I'll declare the public hearing closed. Councilor Young-Kampen?

All right, I now declare the public hearing to be open. Is there anyone here to speak on the item? Anyone online? If you're online, you can use the raise hand feature. All right, seeing none, I will declare the public hearing closed. Any discussion or preference on this item?

Trying to figure out which ward councilor this would fall under. I thought so. Do you want to send this one to committee since we don't hear from the, well, anyone on it? Are you okay approving it tonight? I will note that typically when representatives from Eversource come, they effectively just read what we have in front of us. So that's typically this. We're not missing out on information we usually would receive by there not being anyone here to speak from it, there being no other questions.

If no one's here to speak on it, we certainly could send it to committee.

Rather than send it to committee, can't we just lay it on the table or something for next meeting? We can do that as well.

Ah, we have someone here. All right, I'm going to reopen the public hearing so that we have someone online. Who is it? Emmy McSweeney, you would like to speak on this item? This is item 3.3, Fellsway West.

All right. Well, we will... It can't be withdrawn once it's on the agenda, but let's table that one until we make sure we get the correct procedural, what's the word I'm looking for? Treatment handling. All right, very well then. So item 3.3 will lay on the table. Next item, Madam Clerk.

All right, I now declare the public hearing to be open. Is there anyone here to speak on the item?

Okay. Anyone else here to speak on the item? All right, seeing none, I declare the public hearing to be closed. Any discussion? Any objections? No? All right, that item is approved. Emmy, before you go, I just want to note that item 3.2, we sent to committee because there were some questions from some abutters there, so we'll take that up in committee and make sure that you have a notice when that's going to be on agenda, okay?

All right, thank you. So yeah, 3.4 is approved. All right, let's take item 3.3 off the table, and the clerk informs me that we can withdraw it live here this evening at the request of the applicant, so it shall be done. Consider it withdrawn. All right very good now let's go back to our out of order items we've got a few more exciting stuff we want to get to before we go through everything else in order if there's no objection I'd like to wave the rules to take up item 8.3 Out of order seeing no objection madam clerk agenda item 8.3 An officer's communication conveying the municipal special el

All right, thank you, Director Salerno. Any discussion, any questions? No, all right, seeing none, thank you. You as well, that item is placed on file. Our next item out of order at the request of the administration. So I'd like to waive the rules to take item 7.9 out of order. If there's no objection, seeing none, Madam Clerk.

Okay, thank you. And the request is, if it's the will of the council, to approve this lease this evening, that's correct? Mm-hmm. Okay. Questions? Councillor Scott?

Thank you, Mr. President. I don't have any questions. I very much appreciate being provided with the lease so that I can review it before the meeting. I also want to say thank you to... Director Scherf of Arts of the Armory for providing the city council with a letter giving us a heads up that the lease had been finalized and conveying their continued concerns. I'm grateful for the work of staff to try to get this thing buttoned up and put away in a satisfactory manner and for being responsive to those concerns and making edits to the lease. And it's my fervent wish that the city can manage to

1:06:12 – 1:07:08•NSNaima Sait

Through you, Mr. President. Yeah, so, as you know, I'm the World Councilor, so I've been following this for years at this point. When I first got on the Council, January, this was the first order I put in, the Council order, which is securing leases for the Armory tenants. Yeah, I'm very excited about this moment. I want to thank the administration and everyone who's worked on this. And I'm looking forward to this next chapter, and I'm really glad you're joining the team and you will be, you know, the... you know, the connection, right, between, you know, the city and all these tenants, making

I'll I just think mr president I just want to say that you know just today I was having a conversation with council Union campen and a few others about how arts at the Army really kind of punches above their weight and I'm just so happy that that we've got this locked in now or that we're about to have it locked in and you know I really hope that we're gonna make sure that we as we keep moving forward that we the the renewal processes are smooth And I assume that now that we've got a wonderful person in there to look it over we we will have that just that Councilman Yeah, thank you.

1:07:53 – 1:08:14•WMWilfred N. Mbah

Mr. President just to underscore my tool saying that we should never forget why we took that building. I You know, so it's been like long overdue just to echo Councillor Scott's sentiment. You know, my hope is that we're going to preserve the artists that were there. That's it.

Thank you. All right. Seeing no further discussion. Councillor Wheeler. Councillor Wheeler.

Thank you, Mr. President. Just very briefly, I just wanted to appreciate this work, to appreciate the coming together in all the legal negotiations of all the different parties involved in order to enable arts, because that's ultimately what we're trying to do here. And I hope that both in this work this year and in our work going forward, we really are holding on tightly to this idea that arts are not made to fit in legal contracts. And we have a system that requires them. We need to do everything by the book. But as much as possible, if we can build approaches that welcome and support the fl

All right, seeing no further discussion, Councilor Sait moves for approval. That requires a roll call, I believe, Madam Clerk. Sorry? All right, very good. I call the roll.

All right, very good, thank you. All right, next item out of order. This is another item at the request of the administration. I'd like to waive the rules to take up items, actually, item 7.3 and 7.7 together and out of order. Seeing no objection then, Madam Clerk, would you read those too?

Very good, any questions? All right, seeing none, thank you. So item 7.7 is approved, and item 7.3 requires a roll call for approval. Would you call the roll on that, please, Madam Clerk?

All right, very good. Next item out of order, another request from the administration to take item 7.2 out of order. So I'll request to waive the rules. And seeing no objection, Madam Clerk, would you read 7.2?

Any discussion? Councilor Link and then Scott.

Thank you, Mr. President. A question. So not our last finance meeting, but the one before that, we had two grants come up for E911. And both of those, for one reason or another, even though we knew we were applying for a grant, we had to still ask for the money in the budget. We have the grant now, and those grants were for $295,000 and $159,000, which seems like it would more than cover this. So I'm just curious why we need to use wage stabilization funds when it looks like we have in our police operating budget this amount that we need.

It is a very subtle thing, the difference between the stabilization fund and the salary contingency account. I just had one question, just to be perfectly clear about this. This is not a request to ratify a new contract agreement. This is simply a funding appropriation to pay the prior year balance of an agreement that's already been reached, correct?

All right, thank you, Mr. President. Any further questions, discussion?

All right, seeing none, that also requires a roll call vote. Madam Clerk, would you call the roll on approval?

All right, thank you. One more in this category, requesting the administration to take up item 7.5 out of order. So I'll make that request to waive the rules and take up item 7.5, seeing no objection. Madam Clerk.

No, all right, seeing none, that item is approved.

Thank you, Mr. President, and through you to Alice Salisbury. Thank you so much. This is a very informative and interesting presentation. You just alluded to getting feedback from staff, but I was wondering if you could say a little bit more about the, because I imagine many, many, many city staff would have a relationship to these ordinances, and how do you envision that process going in terms of getting feedback?

questions I just need to point out you used a whole lot of words to say that we've got to get rid of more words in our code of ordinances mr. president through you to councillor McLaughlin I am nothing if not loquacious yes big undertaking thank you for this I do say on the positive I will say I hope that a revision of the ordinances will lead to the valid legitimate ordinances that we have that don't always get enforced. Maybe it'll be more clear and easy to understand, and we can get a vacant storefronts ordinance, for example, to be enforced, or many other ordinances that we spend a lot of

Thank you, Mr. President. I just wanted to say I think everyone can hear loud and clear the passion for this work that came through from our legislative analyst. And I just want to say I very much appreciate this precise, pedantic passion.

Thank you, Mr. President. I am a little worried that we're going to have horses running rampant roughshod over the city, but I'll wait to see. No, I'm really excited to see. I had actually noticed many years ago all the horses, and I'm glad to see that we're going to have some things that don't make sense out of there to make it a lot more digestible for people so that they can actually go through the ordinances and see what's what. And I guess I'm excited to see it. And I guess I just, as one counselor who's not on legislative matters, I'm... Excited and scared because I want to make sure tha

Other discussion? I will take the liberty of speaking from up here, if I may, just to echo the thanks. As has been the case many, many, many times, I'm just sitting here thinking, boy, we got the right guy for this job. So glad that you are, sorry, so sorry and glad that you are undertaking this task. And I just want to express my gratitude for the work you've already done, the work that you're going to be doing. and express, you know, on behalf of myself at least, you know, full support and cooperation, whatever you need at any point. And I hope my colleagues, and I'm sure my colleagues will

Okay, very well. And so what that translates to is that then the council, the then council, will be digesting the first phase of this process, either maybe during budget, during recess, and or more materially probably in the fall, given the given what our spring looks like and early summer looks like.

Well, you know, sometimes we can walk and chew gum at the same time. That's why we have finance committee meetings more often now than we have. So we'll see how it all plays out. And I will say, you know, to whomever is serving as president next year, I think, you know, that it would behoove the council to consider the right approach to this, whether that's in the committees, as you sort of alluded to, whether that's in the committees we currently have or creating a special committee. and that'll be a decision to be made. I think at the time, but based on what we all have in front of us and wh

I'm thinking more in terms of how long the docket and legislative matters happens to be whenever this comes down, and for whomever it is, thinking about what makes the most sense. But I know that we will have, at that point, hopefully, barring any catastrophes, have a full council back again, and we'll get it all sorted and work it out. Any other questions? Councillor Bob.

1:51:20 – 1:51:37•WMWilfred N. Mbah

Thank you, Mr. President. I just want to echo your sentiment to Dr. Salisbury. For all the work you've done, you always bring a lot of passion. You have my full support behind this work. So thank you. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilor Mba.

All right, thank you, Brandon. I see no further questions then. That item is placed on file, and I'd like to waive the rules to take up item 8.1, if there's no objection. Madam Quick, would you read 8.1?

Thank you, Mr. President. I have reviewed this, and as much as I would tend to want to only include the discretion of the Council President as the way to conduct this particular review, I don't have a problem with it as submitted. I'm fine with having it approved tonight.

Councillor Link. Thank you, Mr. President. Do we want to consider adding a definition section to this?

As long as it includes without limitation Oxford commas and colons, semicolons.

We're just going to throw all of them in there just for fun. Any other discussion, questions? All right, seeing none, Council Hart moves to approve. This is an ordinance that is before us the first time. It would require approval, enrollment, and ordainment. So on approval, seeing no discussion, Madam Clerk. Roll call on approval. Oh, we don't need approval? Okay, we'll take it. All right, so then seeing no objection to that as approved, and then we need roll call on enrollment and ordainment. So let's start with enrollment, please.

That is now appropriate for ordainment, Madam Clerk.

All right. Very good. Analyst Salisbury, you have your ordinance. or at least as soon as the other, shall we? Councilor Young-Kampen would like to move to reconsider in the hopes that reconsideration fails. On reconsideration, anyone want to change your votes? All right, seeing none, reconsideration has failed. Now you have your ordinance. All right. Thank you again. All right, folks, time to start the meeting. Madam Clerk, back to the regular order of business, which I think takes us right to 4.1, is that right? All right, let's go. Actually, hold on. Would folks like a quick recess, or have

Two minutes. Well, let's call it five, and we'll be right back. So stand and recess for five minutes. All right. I can do that. I call this meeting back to order. I don't have to ask. I can see that there is a quorum present. Madam Clerk, would you read the next item, please?

2:07:41 – 2:10:38•NSNaima Sait

Thank you, Mr. President. First, I would like to thank PSAF staff, our land use analyst, Samantha, our policy analyst, Brandon, for working with me on this amendment. I would also like to thank my constituent, Denise Provo, whose experience helped to bring this issue to my attention and staff's attention. It was like a year and a half ago, or two years at this point. If you have been to Denise's yard, you know that she has one of the biggest silver maple trees in the city. She's been taking care of the tree for decades. The whole neighborhood gets to enjoy the tree. The tree is over 150 years.

I just want to commend the Ward 5 Councilor on this one. It's like a very, it's the ideal kind of fix where it's very concise, goes in there, solves the problem. It's fantastic. And, you know, I just also want to call it for anyone watching at home, for this kind of situation, too, it wouldn't necessarily only be your recourses and only the city, because having... I'm certainly not a lawyer, but I've read enough of the tree law things where, you know, there's definitely other civil litigations. So if this ever does happen to you, use every single tool that's available to you, please. Counsel B

2:11:26 – 2:11:45•WMWilfred N. Mbah

Yeah, thank you, Mr. President. Just to echo Counsel Link. Thank you, Counsel Saeed. I mean, I know exactly that situation. We you know, wrestle with it for quite a while. Even the previous administration, we came here to City Hall, met ISD. They said there's nothing they can do. So this is, you know, the only recourse that we need to take.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. President. A rule of thumb I have heard from people who know a lot more about trees than I do is that tree roots are at least two times as wide as the tree branch canopy. And so that means that excavation 20, 30 more feet away from a tree can cut into roots and risk killing it. And so, you know, along with the real needs that we have for housing to be built we really need sensible tree policies like this to work with development to protect our trees especially the grand old trees which as my colleague mentioned can be much older than anyone in this room thank you all

2:12:42 – 2:14:33•NSNaima Sait

Through you, Mr. President, this is another issue that was brought to attention by Ward 5 constituents. We know that now with the Mass Save programs, we have more neighbors applying and benefiting to get heat pumps or insulation. And yeah, with the summer's getting warmer, Yeah, we have just more applications with MassSave. Therefore, people also have to pull permits to get that work done. We know that program also had a huge cut recently, and MassSave now works with just 15 contractors for installation, and then if you're doing heat pumps, the chances that you go with them, too. So... Making

2:14:36 – 2:15:28•WMWilfred N. Mbah

Yeah, thank you, Mr. President. I would like to co-sign this. And yeah, I've also, this is a common issue complain that I also hear from residents, because we have these ambitious climate goals, and yet we don't have a blueprint for residents to be able to implement. So this is part of that process. How do you make it easy for people to move to that clean energy transition? Residents are curious. They're eager to also adapt, but sometimes they say there's no... roadmap to be able to do it. And also, it's not even easy. The process is kind of still antiquated. So this is, you know, one part of,

Thank you, Mr. President. Once again, thank you to the Ward 5 counselor for bringing this. And on the note of what my counselor at large just said, I guess I'm curious to the administration if this might be like a really good way to pilot some of the ideas where we've been talking about, you know, combining permits and bulk permitting and, you know, it's one small thing and it might be a really easy way to try to help people hit those climate goals without having to go through some sort of onerous process and then we can maybe, if that's successful, bring that success to the rest of our permit

2:16:16 – 2:16:44•NSNaima Sait

Yeah, we'll just add one more thing, Mr. President, and someone who had heat pumps installed a few months ago. You know, working with contractors who are HVAC contractors, you know, a lot of them, they're doing this one-man show. They do everything. They don't have administrative staff. They certainly don't have the time to go through a website and, you know, look for documents. And, you know, some English is not necessarily your first language.

2:17:11 – 2:17:55•NSNaima Sait

Thank you, Mr. President. So this is a grant that we apply for every year. Before it comes before us again for approval, usually the last one you approved it in January of this year, I would like to hear from SPD about the financial breakdown of how this grant was used, the areas of education, enforcement, And I think it's a good practice for us once a year to have an opportunity to discuss ways the community can best benefit from this grant by identifying the current needs and, yeah, improving our practices. I would like to send this to traffic and parking, Mr. President.

Okay, Councilor Lake, do you want to speak on this? Councilor Lake?

Yeah, thank you again. I just keep saying thank you through you to our Ward 5 counselor. You know, as one of the members of the Finance Committee who approved this grant, I've not been totally happy with the reality of where the rubber meets the road, if we can mix in some transportation metaphors. So we're hearing just from community members once again that people are getting stopped in intersections, crossing safely during a pedestrian cycle. We already know that that's If you're yielding to progressions properly, then it's the safest thing that a person on a bike can do rather than staying

Thank you, Mr. President. I'd like to co-sponsor this item. We apply for this grant every year, as my colleagues have mentioned, and as they have also mentioned, there's been real confusion and inconsistency in the past about what it is asking our city to do and what we want our city to do in response to a grant like this. there in 2024 I've seen some back and forth between the police department and the pedestrian transit Advisory Committee trying to get clarification and there have been at least some understandings in the course of this grant over the years that in the hours that are dedicate

Thank you Mr. President. This is kind of a continuation of the work that Councillor Hart and I have started with the short-term rentals ordinance and have been helped by Councillor Ewan Campin who has some residents in his ward who had a pretty clear and well-defined case of how we could change, make a small change to this ordinance and create actual substantive change. So it's become pretty clear that if we just did this one thing, we'd have, with the good intentions of the ordinance, the overly broad definition of that being of a place being your primary residence the that test it was a litt

Councilor Hart, do you want to speak on this?

Sure. Thank you, Mr. President. I just echo what my colleague at large just said and laid out the problem very well. And I appreciate his crafting this specific ordinance to address this one thing. And like you said, we're going to keep working on it. Thank you.

2:25:50 – 2:26:22•WMWilfred N. Mbah

Councilor Batton. Thank you. But I really appreciate the intent. I know even a friend that I just saw yesterday, she went to Greece. She was doing research there. So this is like people travel around, they do research for a couple of months. I think it's okay for them to kind of like, it's just normal that this is something that they can use that as a short-term renter because this is, but that's their permanent residence. So I think I appreciate the thoughtfulness in it. Thank you, Councilman.

All right, any further discussion? All right, seeing none, that is referred to legislative matters. Next item.

I don't have much to say, if we could just go send it to Tractor Mark.

Do you want to send it to committee, or just follow up? Yeah, just follow up. All right, that item is approved. Next item.

Councillor Link. I'll just say real quick, I think we've heard from constituents that our leaf blower ordinance is largely ignored. I'm not sure what the fix is there but the reason that we made the ordinance is because we had acknowledged that it these gas powered leaf blowers create a tremendous amount of noise and air pollution and I'm just saying if we agree that that's a problem we shouldn't be running gas powered leaf blowers around schools during school hours and as person who's very well aware at this point as an Argentine parent of the AIM program that's come to the school. We've got

I'm reminded of a presenter we had a long, long time ago who mentioned that there was a whole list of ordinances he hears about a lot that seemed to be not doing what they were intended. Or, in fact, what the literal words of the ordinance say can and can't happen, hypothetically speaking. Any further discussion? You want to follow up with this one committee or look for a response to the administration?

Yeah, if we could put that one in the school building facilities and maintenance committee.

School building facilities and maintenance.

Yeah, I mean, sure. Or it could go, I don't have, it doesn't have to go there.

Since you chair that committee, I'm happy to set it that way, unless there's any objection. All right, so that's approved with a copy of the school buildings, facilities, and maintenance. Next item.

No Mr. President. So I'll just say, I was a little surprised to learn that the, the Ralph and Jenny center was had been closed to the alcoholics anonymous meetings. I learned that recently. And you know, I guess for me, so in my family there is a history of substance use disorder and. I know how important these meetings are for people's recovery so that they can maintain recovery. And I think that as a community, we say we want to see our community taken care of. We want to make sure that we're seeing fewer people who have these issues, and we want to make sure that we see our community being

Thank you, Mr. President. I too was surprised to hear that this happened because I spoke to the city about this several months ago. I was led to believe that the AA program would not be moved until there was a suitable replacement space. So this is very frustrating to me as someone who also has had family members go through the AA program and actually recover using their program, and as someone who represents this ward and the building that it's in that is now owned by the city that we really don't have a stated plan for. I'm sure everyone here knows about 90 Washington Street. There's a lot o

Councillor Clayton? Mr. President, thank you. This is the first I'm learning of this group being evicted from this property. It sounds like the ward council's been on it and it sounds like it's sort of being addressed by the city, but You know, I can't for the life of me figure out Why so early in the process with no plan at all? I mean, I'm thinking it's probably DPW workers have to open or close it. It's now City Pride, you know, but that's really unfortunate that meeting has been going on for I don't even know how many years. And they've now been displaced, and that is really, really upsett

So the issue is, is that the city now owns this building, which very similar to the armory. It's like, hooray, we own this building. Now we can do something with it. And now there's a number of liability issues that go with it, with who owns the property, who gets to have a key, for example. So there are issues that make it difficult to allow just random people to have access to this building. But when I discussed this with the city, it was understood that they would not be ending meetings until we found a replacement for them. And it doesn't sound like that's happening. So that's what's frust

I see Director Najee Williams with a metaphorical hand up, I guess.

Any further discussion? If this one is, Councilor Strezla, the item that was, that Director Najeeb Williams mentioned that was discussed in HCD, is that, was that discharged from committee or is it still in committee?

2:34:40•KSKristen Strezo

That's a very good question, Mr. President.

Just ask, because I don't want to send the same issue to two separate committees.

2:34:46 – 2:35:30•KSKristen Strezo

If you want to, we can discuss it with the minutes and send it back to committee. I'm perfectly fine with that. That was, yes, the last item on the agenda that we talked about it in, but that was, so we were not talking about the Ralph and Jenny Center On that agenda item, we were talking about the St. James Church in Ward 7. And it came out that AA was meeting with Ralph and Jenny and that St. James was a consideration of one of the possible rehoming locations, et cetera. That's how it came out. But we can sever the item when we get to the meeting minutes and send it back to committee. I am f

Councillor McLaughlin, you want to have this conversation about public health, public safety? I think it's appropriate on either committee. I think I have a whole separate issue. I can't be in two. What's that? Can't be in two. That's the only issue.

I think it's worth to, well, why don't we approve the item tonight? in housing and then I can take it up in public health. Does that make sense? Because I have a whole separate issue with the use of the building itself.

Yeah, okay. So let's, we'll approve this item. We tentatively will have a copy to public health, public safety, so long as we don't have the same item still in HECD, HCD, whatever it is. And we'll resolve that when we get.

2:36:12•KSKristen Strezo

Mr. President, it's October now. I know. I think, I don't know.

All right, very good. So that is approved to the Copy of the Public Health and Public Safety. Next item, Madam Clerk.

I'd like to sign on to this, please. I really appreciate this straightforward and useful resolution. Thank you.

Councillor Link would like to sign on. All right, that item is approved.

2:37:52•KSKristen Strezo

And may I also read the next agenda item alongside this? We can take this up together.

Councillor Strezow would like to take item 4.11 up together. Seeing no objection, Madam Clerk.

2:38:19 – 2:42:42•KSKristen Strezo

You are welcome. I'm keeping you awake at 15 to 10. You're welcome. And for emphasis, I did very much want 4.11 to be placed on our agenda item as written, as specific as that, because If the urinal was such an issue for so long at the Winter Hill School that it eventually had a nickname, then it has been a problem for a long time and neglected for a long time, and we should be addressing that. So this item, or these two items... came originally from a public testimony at a school committee several weeks ago. And I heard possibly the best public testimony I ever heard in all of our years of pu

Mr. President, I would love to talk about the blaster until it's fixed.

All right, very good. Thank you. So those two items are approved with a copy to school buildings, facilities, and maintenance. Next item.

Thank you, Mr. President. So it's no secret that lots of small-scale internal carpentry and repairs in homes in the city are done under the table. So I'm talking about replacing baseboard molding, hanging a new door that requires sanding and cutting the doorway, installing a new bathroom cabinet. But officially, you are supposed to have a building permit for all these things. I know someone who hired a carpenter for a few hours for a small project where the city came by and shut down the work because he did not have a permit. So it's a real requirement. But if you go and try to do this the rig

Councilor Lange would like to sign on for the discussion? All right, seeing none, that item is approved.

Mr. President, would it make sense to refer it to licenses and permits to follow up?

Certainly could. I'm trying to think of this. That's probably as good a place as any, I guess. Well, housing community development, housing H-2, with that one.

Madam chair you want to take this on in licenses and permits give us something to talk about I'm happy to just wondering about you know staff time that because we don't usually in licenses and permits have staff come so if it's easier to

Director Najeeb Williams, does the administration have a preference just in terms of staff that would need to address this and where they usually, you know, what committees they anticipate showing up in the next month or two? I know that's a, we want to make it easy for folks so they don't have to show up to too many different committees if they can.

It's a question to Director Najeeb Williams. Council Whaley, do you want to add something?

I just wanted to point out it would not necessarily need to be an appearance soon. I understand that there's going to be work on this for some months. It would be nice to get an update at some point that makes sense for the administration along the way.

Maybe we could approve this today and put something in new yeah I was just I was just going to suggest the other option would be to just approve this if the administration's working on it and then we and we have a you know a milestone down the Road where they have something to share we can put another item in or perhaps receiving a you know if there's I guess it probably would be approvals of the council for that sort of change, but we can do that too if you want to let them work on it a bit. And the request here has been made. I think it's heard loud and clear. I see nodding from Director Naj

All right, I see the whole council would like to sign on this one. Councillor Hart.

Thank you, Mr. President. So last week, I'm sure everyone is aware of the devastating fire that happened in Teal Square. And, you know, I've been my thoughts are, you know, still with the 43 residents who were displaced. And but I'm so appreciative of the response by our firefighters and and all the first responders, it was just incredible that everybody was able to be evacuated without injuries, although I understand that some firefighters did sustain minor injuries. So many city staff have been working so hard from the time that they arrived on the scene that night until today, have been wor

Thank you. Further discussion? All right. That item is placed on file. Next item. All right. Sorry. That item is approved. I've got my items mixed up here. My bad. That item is approved. Thank you. Next item.

Thank you, Mr. President. The Finance Committee met on Tuesday, October 6, 2026, via remote participation, with four members present at the start and all five by the end, and with the help of Assistant City Clerk Madeline Letellier. We took up a nine-item agenda. We approved a prior year invoice of approximately $10,000 for DeNovo, which provides housing related legal services, primarily to immigrant residents through the Office of Housing Stability. We also approved two transfers of leftover community Preservation Act debt service money back into reserves, approximately $150,000 for community

2:55:37 – 3:01:15•KSKristen Strezo

We had our regular... Committee on Wednesday, September 30, 2026. It was at 6 p.m. and it was hybrid, so in person and virtual. We had all three members in attendance. We discussed and approved the one-year action plan for the community development block grant, which is a regular annual action plan that we we talk about in It was interesting to see the updates and the dialogue was definitely flowing. We will have to, I will be asking to sever the items because as you can tell, there were two agenda items on this that were virtually identical. So I'll come back to that before I ask for approval

Do you wish to vote? Councilor Strezza moved to sever the two items that she mentioned. Those were severed because there was no objection. The council then approved the committee report as submitted and now we have the two severed items before us.

3:01:28•KSKristen Strezo

Okay, thank you. And then the second item, 260870, I am asking to move for approval of that one.

So let's take this one step at a time. So the first one at 260688, you want to have placed on file? Correct. All right. No objection. That's placed on file. And then 260870, you move to approve. Yes. All right. So that item is before us for approval. Any discussion on the motion? Seeing none, that item is approved. Great. Thank you. Next item.

All right. Any discussion on the report? Seeing none, that report is approved. Next item.

Councillor McLaughlin. Thank you, Mr. President. We did meet. We met mostly to discuss the warming center that many people were interested in learning about. Unfortunately, we weren't able to discuss that item due to the fire in Teal Square and many city officials had to. That obviously took priority, so we weren't able to discuss that. I am going to schedule another meeting soon so that we can have a full discussion. One item that did get discussion is that the Commission of Public Works invest in trash barrels with latches to address rodent issues. We discussed this issue. DPW is looking int

All right. Councilman Goffin moves to approve the report as submitted. Any discussion? Seeing none, that item is approved. Next item.

Thank you, Mr. President. So the School Building Facilities and Maintenance Committee met for just a tad under 50 minutes. We discussed with the commissioner of DPW and the director of PSOF how to deal with snow. Kind of closing out an old item. So we've learned that the DPW has created a three-step process where step one is, you know, while the storm is happening or shortly thereafter, making sure the doors and ADA ramps are clear and culminating with step three, which is where, which happens after the storm. And that's where we see the schoolyards and parking and whatnot being cleared. And t

Councillor Link asked that the report be accepted as submitted. Any discussion? Seeing none, that item is approved. Next item.

3:10:06 – 3:15:44•NSNaima Sait

Through you, Mr. President, Traffic and Parking Committee met with all three members present. We discussed the Pedestrian and Transit Advisory Committee's public comment regarding the bus network redesign. The MBTA Board of Directors previously voted to endorse the system redesign, which included changes to Route 80. But the MBTA has more recently been committed to fine-tuning the proposal and being open to feedback. We discussed that losing the current 80 bus route would be a major loss for supporting the 115 Sagamore School. We learned that the Western Pearl Street reconstruction was planned

All right. Any discussion on the committee report? All right. Seeing none, that is approved. Next item.

I'm sorry, clerk. I can interrupt you because I move to waive the readings and refer to the finance committee this item, 7.1, as well as 7.4, 7.6, and 7.8.

All right, Councilor Wheeler moves to waive the rest of the reading of 7-1, all of 7-4, 7-6, and 7-8. And refer those items to finance. Yes. Seeing no objection, those items are referred to finance. Next item.

That item is referred to confirmation of appointments. Personnel matters. Next item.

That item is placed on file with a copy to Housing Community Development and Equity. Next item.

Still a great season for block parties. Check out the list. See if your street's on there. If your street's not on there and you haven't had a block party recently, or even if you did, have another one. Call the clerk's office. Find out how to do a block party because they're wicked fun. It's the year of the neighbor. Get together with your neighbors on your block. That's all I've got to say about block parties. That item is placed on file.

Yes, I'd like to move to waive the readings of 9.1 through 9.3 and approve this evening and also just note the citywide fall cleanup on November 7th.

November 7th. You all heard it here first, or maybe not first, but you heard it here. I read it in an email. Maybe you read it somewhere else, but we're gonna clean up the city on November 7th. Any discussion? All right, seeing none, those three items are approved.

Mr. President, if I could answer that. So just for that item, I just wanted to call out that, where is it? Here we are. So Union Square Neighborhood Council has a CBA with them, and also that any change here potentially changes the amount, or not potentially, does change the amount of aid space.

So when that items taken up, I'd love it if people would those things into account very good and we need to send that copy that to the planning board for Public hearing as well and I'm sorry councillor link. Hold on. Hold on. We're gonna do this according to the rules We need a copy of that one to planning board as well.

All right, okay council wheeler on this item Apologize I was just trying to to hear what my colleague said. I

Mr. President, through you. So the ACE space, which is the Arts and Creative Enterprises space. So in this Boynton Yards overlay, this zoning amendment reduces the amount of residential space. And the ACE space is a percentage of that. So therefore, it would further reduce that.

Okay, so that is referred to land use with a copy to the planning board. Next item.

All right, that item is placed on file with a copy to Public Health and Public Safety. Next item.

That'll be placed on file with a copy to Legislative Matters. Next item.

I believe this is an already rescheduled item because of the storm a little bit ago, if I'm remembering correctly. Any discussion on this one? Seeing none, Councilor Hart moves to approve. All right, and I see no discussion. That item is approved.

Councilor Ewan Campin moves to approve this one. Any discussion? All right, seeing none, that item is approved.

Seeing no objection, we'll waive the rules to waive the readings, send those items to land use with a copy to the planning board for each of the four.

All right. With that, Councilor Ba moves to adjourn, and we are adjourned. Thank you, everyone.