Finance Committee - Regular Meeting

Alright. Good evening, everyone. I'm Jake Wilson. He, him pronouns, councilor large and your finance committee chair. It's 06:01PM, and I'd like to call to order the Tuesday, 12/09/2025 meeting of the finance committee at the Summerhall City Council. First, I need to read you all this. Pursuant to chapter two of the acts of 2025, this meeting of a city council committee will be conducted via remote participation. We will post an audio video recording and a comprehensive record of these proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting on the city of central website and local cable access government channels. Clerk, could you please call the roll to establish quorum?

Yep. This is roll call. Councilor Mbaugh?

Present.

Councilor Burnley? Present. Councilor Klingen?

Present.

Councilor Scott? Present.

Chair Wilson? Present.

Alright. With that, we have everyone here, so we do have

Excellent. I wanna thank you all for, for for being here. Good to have a 100% attendance. We're gonna take up tonight's agenda in the order posted. We will, start with the approval of of the minutes from our previous meeting, and that is ID number 25Dash1779. Approval of minutes of the finance committee meeting of 11/19/2025. On the minutes, any discussion? Alright. The minutes are laid on the table. We recommend approval with one vote here at the end of the night.

We're gonna go now to our second agenda item, ID number 25Dash1742. It's a mayor requesting authorization to borrow $3,057,826 in a bond and to appropriate the same amount for the fiscal year 2026 street resurfacing program. And we're gonna take this up along with our first appropriation, ID number 25Dash1743. Mayor requested approval to appropriate $3,000,000 from the street reconstruction and resurfacing stabilization fund for the FY 2026 street resurfacing program. And I see we have, director Michael Richards, from IAM and also, director Brian Postalway from engineering.

Take it away, please, whoever wants to take lead on this.

Thank you, sir. I'll, I'll get this started. Again, Michael Richards, director of finance and administration for the department of infrastructure and asset management. We've requested that these two items be considered together as they're part of our comprehensive f y 20 '6 street resurfacing program. This is part of our annual, appropriation request, that's been included on our five year CIP.

This request in a moment, director Brian Post will wait. We'll we'll share kind of our overall plan, how these are allocated and used. But this, keeps us on track with our five year CIP. This request is in line with that total. The stabilization request is, requested here to defray some of that cost or or relieve some of the burden on the bonding and the borrowing authorization.

We had previously, expected to request 6,057,000 and change on the bond. And with director Bean's guidance, we've reduced that to 3,057,000 and change with 3,000,000 from stabilization to, again, decrease that that, that impact on the borrowing authorization. So these funds will be supplemented by other funding sources as, again, part of our comprehensive f y twenty six total streets package.

Alright. Thanks for that. Colleagues, any discussion? I'm sure there's something. $6,000,000 expenditure. We all, we all good with this?

Wish we could pave more streets, sir.

You and me both. You and me both, counselor. Alright. Yeah. I'll echo, our vice chair's comments there and and, say, more of this, please. Colleagues, anything else on this?

Just, since you since you keep, kinda, like, activating us, I guess, you know, like, I'm just curious to know if this is this will be somehow, fully funded street resurfacing program for 2026?

Through the excuse me, counselor. Can you please repeat that question?

No. I'm wondering, like, if this is you know, this amount, you know, required you know, are both amounts, you know, required to fully fund the fiscal year twenty twenty six resurfacing program for the streets?

Yes. Thank you. So as I mentioned, these two authorizations are part of overall five funding sources that will be used for two f y '26 streets package projects. Director Postalwaite has a a PowerPoint presentation that he shared that I think maybe be be loaded as well. On the tenth page of that presentation if director Postal Wade is here, but maybe, I'll kinda spoil it here for you, councilor Namba.

You'll see the bottom, we have five different funding sources, one being chapter 90 for one nearly 1,900,000.0 f y twenty six fair share, which is, just a a bonus allotment from the state similar to the Masstad chapter 90 program. Our f y twenty six operating budget is the PAYGO, and then you'll see that Citi bond and the stabilization fund. So these five funds combined will fund the two projects that director Postalway can get into for you as well.

Gotcha. Thank you.

Alright. Director Postalway, you wanna take it away?

Absolutely. And I will maybe spoil a little bit it. The majority of the presentation is the same as what you all heard last year. I think you've all seen the presentation before. I think this slide is the most important slide, and and I'll just cover a couple points on this before we go back to it.

We'll we'll flip through the rest of it quickly. Two key points here. One is always we are as director Richards noted, we are following our five year CIP plan. We'd scheduled to spend about $9,000,000 on f y twenty six, and we are moving forward with that. We broke this year's project up into two separate projects.

One is our annual streets resurfacing project, which is, if you remember some previous presentations, is a book job project. It is a quick project to get out the door, and we are currently working with PCS to get this out on the street within the next month or two. And it uses state funds so that we can get this out the door quickly. The bond authorization, the stabilization fund is primarily going to fund the West Pearl Street Complete Streets project, which we are currently wrapping up design on, with our consultant. We have done a number of, public outreach programs to discuss the project with the community.

And so that's why we've broken these up into two separate projects so that we could expedite both of them on the time scale that was best suited for the design work on each. We will be including a certain amount of specific ADA improvements and various street reconstruction on the Western Pearl Complete Streets project, primarily because there's a handful of other side streets adjacent or near the West Pearl project that justifies having that element closer to that contract. So, again, we're trying to get as much efficiency as we can out of our contracts by keeping contractors relatively close to where they are doing the bulk of their work. So, clerk, this is the absolute last slide. We can roll to the front, and we can flip through.

And committee, absolutely stop me at any point for questions. Most of this is just reprise information that we have discussed in years past. Next slide. So, again, the primary goals of all of our street reconstruction project is traffic calming and safety, so providing the bike lanes, the speed humps, the raised tables to, to best protect our most vulnerable users and also keep traffic flowing and ADA accessibility.

Councilor Scott, did you have a question during this Yeah. At this point? I see a hand up.

Oh, I I did. I just had a quick one since we were talking about Pearl Street, sir.

Sure. Councilor Scott.

I just wanna wanna be certain. There's been a lot of work done in on Pearl Street over the last few years. And, those those turtles in the intersections in East Somerville, I know they're divisive, but I've heard a lot of people love them. I guess I'm curious. Is the intention for when you say you're you're going west of, McGrath oh, so we're we're only talking about the stretch here between Magoon Square and, McGrath. Is that right?

Through the chair between roughly Gilman Square and McGrath Highway. Gilman. Yeah. So, clerk, if you just scroll down to I think it's slide five. Maybe it's six.

One more. Okay. Next one. I was wrong. Yeah. This one here. So we didn't put the full design on here, counselor, but just showed you but since you asked this, this project starts right at the intersection of Medford and Pearl Street and then continues east until it hits, McGrath Highway. And that's and on the other side of McGrath Highway Mhmm. It ties into the Pearl Street project that we completed a few years ago.

Alright. Just just looking out for my turtles, sir. Thank you.

We will not be touching your turtles.

Put that one in the quotes of the city council minutes, mister chair.

Absolutely. Back to the presentation, director.

Okay. I think it's, slide three we were on. So like every year, we base our street reconstruction prioritization on our five year paving plan. This plan is we develop it every few years to cover the entire city. Just this year, we started on a new three year streets condition assessment.

We have already begun working on the western third of the city. We've re we've assessed the roadway pavement. We are working right now on the sidewalk conditions assessment for West Summerville. This this set of three years analysis is focused on an ADA assessment looking at the specific ADA compliance of our sidewalks because we want to incorporate that into our five year plan more clearly rather than using proxy information, which is what we've been using in the past few years. The, so when we get to executing, and analyzing our next five year plan, we will begin using this new data that we're bringing in over the next over this year, next year, and the following year.

Next slide. Alright. This is just a cover slide. Thanks. So, again, I I alluded to this or mentioned this earlier on the numbers, slide, but we are breaking this up into two separate projects this year.

So we have an annual reconstruction project that, effectively is reconstructing full streets, which is reconstructing the sidewalk and full curb to curb where both the sidewalks and the roadway needs to be reconstructed. On some streets, we are doing just sidewalk construction because the roadway is in excess acceptable condition relative to other streets in the area, but the sidewalks need extra help. And then we have a handful of partial pavements where we're milling and overlay just the travel way where our analysis shows the sidewalks are are not critical to being reconstructed. And that's so that we can prioritize where our constituents and the community need the paving the most, whether it's in the roadway or the sidewalks. We are also doing some accessibility reconstructions.

We know that there are some isolated locations where race crossing, accessible curb ramps, but also speed humps, etcetera, where there are extra locations usually within the within the area of the contract that needs some extra attention for safety and accessibility improvements. Next slide. So we have, as I said, we've already gone out to, or we're preparing to go out to bid for the the first half of this year's contract, and we have our streets assigned. So we have three full streets that we're working on. Holyoke Road, which is over near the Kennedy School.

This is a key road that I wanna highlight for a moment. This street was recently upgraded their gas line. It is also very high on our prioritization list, so we are working with Eversource to receive funds from them to help us pay for reconstructing the street rather than Eversource pay to reconstruct, or pay to do a permanent trench patch, and then we come in and pave it all over again, they are supplementing our funds to, pay for the whole thing, and that absolves them of the requirement to do the permanent trench patch. So we do that moving forward where the trench patch reconstruction for the gas line and the city's work coincide so that we're getting the most efficiency out of the dollars that everybody's spending and also minimizing the construction time that the abutters have to enjoy. The next two streets are Grandview Avenue and Aldersea, and then we are also doing sidewalk only construction on Prescott Street and partial pavement only on Putnam Street.

You'll notice that the last four streets here are primarily focused in the Spring Hill neighborhood. These are streets that we couldn't incorporate into the Spring Hill project, but continue to be high on our list for reconstruction. So now that that project is over, we're pulling that into our annual reconstruction projects. But we did definitely did not wanna be doing annual reconstruction projects in the same work zone as the Spring Hill work at the same time. Next slide.

This slide I mentioned briefly for councilor Scott earlier. The second contract that we're gonna be doing is West Pearl reconstruction. Again, we've been doing some outreach. We've been working on design with the community. We are going to be about complete with design, I would say, by the January, maybe February.

So we're expecting to go out to bid sometime later in the winter. Hopefully, midwinter, late winter, we'll go out to bid, and that will put us into a construction cycle of later this summer, early fall for breaking ground. Next slide. Yes. And I just wanted just to give a shout out to our accessibility team who is really looking around the city on a pretty regular basis, analyzing what sections of our city have isolated ADA repairs that need to be conducted.

Many of these repairs are otherwise in a sidewalk that is otherwise compliant or mostly compliant. So examples are, in the bottom corner, there is a crosswalk with a sidewalk connection to the crosswalk, but no accessible curb ramp. And this one in particular happens to be at Elm Street near Willow, which we have included in this project. So we're gonna be coming in and putting in a curb ramp at this location, but we have a handful of these locations throughout the city. We have other locations where there are trees that don't have accessible routes behind them, so we are working on putting in bump outs around the trees where it fits into the rest of the street network.

These are things that we execute when they are on our list and adjacent to our project. But as many of you will remember from last year, we consult with DPW when there are locations further away from our contracts that aren't efficient for our contractors to do, and we support them in working with their on call contractors to do the same elsewhere in the city. So we will have a portion of funds to go out and address these isolated ADA upgrades. And I believe that brings us to the last slide, which I discussed first and which covers how we're breaking up these two contracts, both where the money is coming from and where the money is going to on each of these contracts. And absolutely happy to answer any questions that the committee may have.

Alright. Thanks, director. Colleagues, what do we have on this one? These two, I should say. Two items are before us here.

Now that you know the full plan. Not all at once, please. Could it be the the presentation has answered all of our questions? If so, how prescient. Alright.

I don't see any questions. I guess, I'll I'll thank you for coming and presenting to us. It's always, it's fascinating to get this view of what's to come. I know that your team, puts a lot of work into packaging this and then doing the work to to make sure that you're trying to address the the most urgent situations. So, I I'll ask a question. A street that, you know, doesn't show up in here but who but the people are are adamant needs some attention. What's the best way to go about doing something about that?

Cher, I think there are there are a couple good pathways for people who have interests in their particular street or one that they go on on a regular basis. I'd say the first and best way is just to ping three one one. If the if the street is already on our five year plan, we will let we will respond of where that street is on our five year plan. And if it is not on our five year plan, we'll explain why it's not on our five year plan. Sometimes there are new things that have happened over the previous years since the five year plan was done, and we do look at the streets as they come in to see if something is substantively different from what our original analysis showed.

It's rare for those things to happen and escape our attention, but like all people, we're not infallible, and, we look into that to make sure. So if there are is a correction that we need to make to our plan, we will apply that information to the following year.

And, director, it's also worth pointing out that, you know, the city is looking at, you know, planned utility work and and whatnot beneath these streets such that we don't wanna go fully resurface the street if it turns out it needs to be dug up for substantial work under that street, you know, shortly thereafter.

You are very correct, sir.

Alright. Well, that was all I had. If no one else has anything, we're gonna lay these two on the table to recommend approval. Thank you both for joining us.

Thank you all. Thank you.

Alright. Clerk, now I wanna take up our fourth and fifth agenda items together. That's ID number 25Dash1747 requesting the appropriation of $205,000 from the Dilboy Field Enterprise Fund retained earnings to the Dilboy Field Enterprise Fund electricity account for delinquent energy bills and ID number 25Dash1748, requesting the appropriation of $225,000 from the unreserved fund balance, free cash, to the Dilboy Field Enterprise Fund electricity account for delinquent electricity bills. We have with us chief of staff Nikki Spencer. I see we have DPW commissioner Jill Lathan.

And is that everyone here to speak on this one, I think? Alright. Whoever wants to take this, please take it away.

That'll be me. Thank you, mister chair. Through you, Nikki Spencer, chief of staff, she, her pronouns. I'm hearing you appearing before you tonight on behalf of Parks and Rec as well as the Valentine administration. When the mayor took office four years ago, we began a diligent effort to locate and centralize paying for utilities across the city into DPW.

There are many utility accounts set up across the organization, and it's been a painstaking effort to identify each account and then relocate them accordingly under DPW. And the two items before you tonight, this was a messier process. Parks and Recreation originally held these electricity accounts for the Dill Boy Field, and the plan was to transfer this responsibility to DPW. Over the last few years, parks and rec has experienced changes in staff as well as changes in location. So parks and rec went from Walnut Street to the Edgely to the TAB.

Paper bills did not always follow. So in addition, at least one of the account numbers changed. As a result, this was not a smooth transition over to, DPW. To prevent this moving forward, an electronic mailbox for invoice middle has been established at Parks and Rec. As you can imagine, we're not thrilled with this outcome, but I also wanna be fair to the parks and rec team, particularly our current finance manager, who is instrumental in investigating this issue with the CFO.

I'm also thankful to our colleagues in DPW for ensuring that payments will be timely going forward. The course of centralizing functions across the city and pursuing efficiencies can be a challenging one. In this instance, it took longer than we would have liked. This administration is committed, however, to resolving these outstanding issues before the end of our term, And I'm joined tonight by the CFO and DPW leadership who can also help answer any questions on this topic.

Thanks for that. I had a sort of more in the weeds question. I'm happy to leave it to to colleagues if they have any higher, higher level questions, I would I would say. Otherwise, I'll start with my in the weeds question. Alright.

As I recall, a couple years back, there was a change in the DillBoy, enterprise fund around how we accounted for, it was something involving electricity. Director Bean, do you remember what that it was in, I think, the f y twenty five budget. It was something like we had been giving all the credits something something about all the credits we've been getting were getting applied to Dilboy, and the change we were making was to stop doing that. And we said we were expecting, as a result, to see larger electricity bills there. Is that ringing a bell at all?

What I to you, mister chair to you, there was a change. The historic supplier and transmitter was Eversource. And back in that fiscal year, think it was February '24, Eversource became the supplier and Direct Energy became the transmitter. So it was a split situation. And just in analyzing, the situation, it appears that DPW has been paying the Direct Energy bills for Dilboy Enterprise Fund off of the DPW budget, but the Eversource bills weren't being paid.

They weren't being paid by Parks and Rec, and there was confusion, I think. I think I believe DPW thought they were paying the full freight with the Direct Energy. But that's the best of my knowledge. I don't remember the the credit situation.

Yeah. I I'm trying to remember what it was. I don't know if it was something involving the when the solar something I I don't don't know. I'm just speculating here. I thought maybe someone might remember better than I did.

I see councilor Scott has a question. The other thing I'll just ask really quickly is, I know it's a it's a priority project for for OSC, to get those old school lights there replaced with LEDs that should see if anyone's looking at the electric bill saying, That's a big number. Replacing those with energy efficient LEDs, and LEDs that also just won't bleed over and light up the neighborhood, I know is a priority, and I think that will help. I'll just point out when I'm a Dull Boy, I can hear the lights. That's usually, when you when you can hear the buzzing of lights, that's not a good sign for for efficiency. So here's to going efficient at Dull Boy. Counselor Scott.

Mister Chair, you were just bringing back some childhood nostalgia. I love a good, yellow sulfur light. So although your point taken about efficiency, I'm sure we can get some, LEDs in in a lower frequency. I just had a question. I mean, I've had so many questions over the years about our past due invoices.

This is a particularly spectacular example. But, you know, not out of character with the problems that we've been trying to run down for years. I guess my only question is, when you look in the detail here, you know, this is goes back to prior to November 2022. But I did see a couple months in '20 or I saw three bills in August 2024, two of which were negative and one of which was positive. And I've never had the electric company send me money. I'm just curious as to what happened here. Is there a standardized payment that was continuing to get drawn, and this is just the surplus above and beyond that? Or how do we how do we end up with those negative figures in August?

I can't speak to that, councilor Scott, to that specific, charge. I don't have I don't try and get into the weeds on each charge. All I'm focusing on the outstanding charges. But there was also a situation where, through the DPW efforts, late charges have been waived on these outstanding bills. So I don't know if that's a factor in that in that credit. I'm not quite sure. I don't know if the DPW commissioner can add to that.

Hi there. Sorry. My framing. I'm I'm grandchildren right now. Yes. So we when we kind of pay some of these bills, sometimes if there was a double payment, they would offer us a credit for that. So with the late payments, we were able to negotiate with them to remove those late payments, in good faith knowing that DPW was gonna be taking over and and cleaning up the these accounts.

Okay. But I I appreciate that, commissioner Lathan, but I don't think that really explains what's happening in those, lines. I I I guess even if they were giving us a credit on our late fees, I'm not sure that would appear as a negative balance from the, from the August 2024. I mean, if we were getting a credit line, I could see that coming down here more recently. I mean, I guess let me ask this question. When did the, fact that we had $300,000 in unpaid electricity bills come to, your awareness or the administration's awareness? Oh, you're you're muted, commissioner. I'm sorry.

From a DPW perspective, we were become aware of this when we got some notices from the utility companies that they wanted to do some shutoffs. And so as we looked into what was happening, this is when this was kinda discovered, and we worked in worked with Parks and Recreation and Ed's team to kind of get to the bottom of what's been happening.

And when when did those notices come in?

I don't know to the chair. I'd have to look back, to see exactly when those come in came in. I know that when Julie's per night was here, she was working with Parks and Recreation and the auditing team to kinda figure out what was kinda happening with these accounts.

Alright. Now, so I guess that that begs me the question then of, who given the director being, I understand you're just trying to get the bills paid and keep the city moving. I appreciate that. And I know operationally, it's important to look forward. I guess I'm just curious, and I don't need to be that person. I'm just curious who is the person that is looking at each one of these line items and making sure that we understand we we've got negative balances. For example, is there a finance director of?

Yes. To the chair of councilor Scott, the DPW fund team with, leading up by with Danielle Palazzo, working with Ed's team is working with this and working really, you know, really well with Linda, the parks and rec, finance director in getting through this. So it's been really a great team effort working with parks and recreation and the finance team, auditing and finance team. So we'll just continue to do that. So we are DPW's committed to, you know, assisting parks and rec and making sure this is this is gets cleaned up appropriately. And and then we'll continue to move forward and take over all these accounts moving forward and, do our due diligence with that.

Alright. Well, I appreciate it as always, commissioner Lathan. You know, every year, I just say, I hope this is the last, last batch of invoices we find in a desk drawer, but, there's always next year as they say in the Red Sox. Thank you, mister chair. I'm all set.

Thank you. And you know what I'll point out? Maybe we should have caught this as a as a committee, looking at the budget. I'm looking back through some past year's budgets. I see about 75,000 a year budgeted for electricity, and all I can find in terms of actuals is 6,800 spent during that time. So I'll put my hand up. I didn't notice that that we were that we had pretty much $0 in actuals coming out of there. You know? Alright.

We did question that, mister chair, by the way. Didn't get a satisfactory response from the prior management at Parks and Rec.

Alright. I'll I'll just you know, in the in the in the realm of, you know, accepting responsibility, that's one that slipped past me. That was that we generally weren't paying the expenses. That that line out of expenses was not generally getting paid. So

Well, sir, I I I will join you in that responsibility as the inheritor to council Rossetti's beast of the budget title. I apologize for not kitchens.

You'll have another shot, councilor. I will not. Alright. Anything else on, on these two?

I guess, mister chairman, what I if allowed, I guess, I would then I have so many comment, but I'll reserve them, you know, for that particular department. But I guess how do we prevent this again from happening? Like, you know, it's just my my main question. Like, can somebody tell me how this is not gonna happen again?

Mister chair, we're gonna consolidate all of these accounts under DPW. It should be paid under one entity, and that should be DPW. And the support staff at DPW should be focusing on all accounts and all buildings in the city. So that's that's that's key. I think that we, you know, we we first of all, we don't want vendors mailing anything to anybody. You know? So we have electronic mailboxes set up in each departments, and it's incumbent upon department heads to facilitate, payment through the electronic mailboxes, with the vendors and and encourage that. In fact, put that into the contracts as well.

Thank you. Thank you, mister chair, Moshe.

Thank you. Alright. Anything else from the committee? Alright. I'll just say thank you all for catching this. Well, I gotta, bring it before us. Good to put this one to bed, and, here's to, I guess, onward and upward. But thank you. Alright. That is going to bring us to, our sixth agenda.

Sorry. Just quickly just I went on the table

to recommend it. Those two items were laid on table of record approval. Thank you

for Awesome.

Thank you.

I needed to give a disposition for that. That will then bring us to our sixth agenda item, ID number 25Dash1744, the mayor requesting the appropriation of $10,643 from the unreserved fund balance, free cash, to the American Rescue Plan Act, ARPA fund to recompense the fund for unallowable expenses. We had discussed this one at a previous council meeting as a full a full body. Any questions here that can be asked in open session? Councilor Scott.

No question, mister chair. I just wanna point out that for the volume of funds that went through the ARPA, this is a very small cleanup. So I'm I'm you know, it's it's an impressive catch. Thank you, sir. All set.

Hear. Hear. I'll echo, the the vice chair's comments and and, commend staff for for catching this one and and fixing it. Alright. Going once, going twice.

This one's laid on the table to recommend approval as well. And then we're gonna take up our seventh and eighth agenda items together. So that's ID number 25Dash1745. The mayor requesting approval to appropriate $250,000 from the community benefits stabilization fund account to the immigrant legal services stabilization fund account for legal services for immigrants and asylum seekers seeking permanent residency. And ID number 25Dash1746, mayor requesting, approval to appropriate $250,000 from the immigrant legal services stabilization fund for legal services for immigrants and asylum seekers seeking permanent residency.

Did I read that twice? I think I read those correctly. If I didn't, somebody let me know. Feels like I just read the same exact thing twice. Anyway, we're taking up agenda items, seven and eight together. Yes. Legislative liaison, Hutter.

Yes, mister Church. Just wanna know what I'm seeing on the screen are different items than what you've just read in. I don't know if the items in the agenda have been moved into a different order. But

Yeah. That's a

I know the

that is an interesting one. Right? I'm looking at that also, and that's that's not helping me figure this one out. How many items do we have on this posted agenda? 22 is correct. Does that mean, clerk, could you scroll down to show the agenda? What are the odds that some of these got flip flopped and that, eighteen and nineteen per chance might be the ones we're looking for?

Terry Wilson, can I ask They're duplicated?

When was the agenda you're referring to posted online?

There's what was sent to I don't know. There's what was sent to the clerk back on they would have been posted Friday, probably.

Interesting. This is the one attached to the meeting online.

Yeah. Yeah. It looks like maybe not to throw anyone under the bus, but it looks like two items were incorrectly put in the wrong in the wrong section of the agenda. Okay. Well, I'm gonna guess that means we can't take up the two items we were looking to take up here because they aren't on the agenda.

Clerk, could you just quickly scan and see if you see anything on that agenda for, from the community benefits stabilization fund and the immigrant legal services stabilization fund. I mean, I guess they're not on there. I'm looking over the agenda as well. Yep. I don't see them. So my view is I don't think we can take those up because they're not on the agenda. Yes. Legislative liaison, Hunter.

Apologies. I didn't

Okay. So my plan is we're gonna have to get these discharged discharged from committee on Thursday night and take them up because these seem like two pretty important things. So, clerk, we're going to if eight and nine are duplicates, I believe, of, or seven and eight are duplicates of later ones. Fourteen forty five and give me one second to look through.

What I see here is also what's in Legistar. So we would, I believe, have to take action based on what we're seeing on the screen.

What if they're duplicates?

That is likely a Kim question. I can text her.

Alright. While we text the clerk well, let's since they're in order, let's take them up. Well, actually, no. We're gonna we're gonna table and we're gonna come back to seven and eight. Clerk, let's roll on to agenda item nine. That is ID number 25Dash1732. The mayor request approval to appropriate $6,750 from the medicinal marijuana stabilization fund for additional duties related to the out of school time activities for FY 2026. We have, from from HHS, we have manager Anoop Malik. Manager, please tell us about this request.

True cheer. I would like to nominate Chris Hosman, the director of Summer Promise, to speak to this item, and I'm here also to, support as well. Chris, would you please?

I I see director Hosman's here with us too. Director Hosman, please take it away.

Thank you so much. So this, request is related to, increased level of duties for the Summer Promise out of school time coordinator. There was an out of school time support position in the Somerville public schools that was eliminated when the person vacated the position. There were additional duties from that, role that were a higher level of duties than what the current out of school time coordinator was tasked with. So we're seeking funds to help to a higher duties allowance temporarily, them to be able to continue the out of school time support work.

Alright. Thank you for that. Any discussion on this request from the committee? Going once, going twice. Alright. The items laid on the table to recommend approval. We're gonna then thank you, director Hosman.

Thank you. We're gonna

take our tenth agenda item now, ID number 25Dash1736. That's the mayor requesting authorization to establish a consolidated gift account for the veteran services department and to accept donations for veterans holiday season uses and veterans in need of financial assistance. Once again, manager Malik.

Anoop Malik, HHS finance manager through chair Wilson. We are requesting authorization to establish this consolidated gift account for the director of Veterans Services department under HHS Health and Human Services. We have received a total of four donations. We had received two last September, and we recently received two more from the same donor. And we had been thinking of what language we would like to use for the restriction, to support the creation of this gift account, and we have landed at, the holiday season users and, veterans who are in need of the financial assistance.

This also supports the donors' wishes as well, including director of, veteran services, Jerome Thomas, who couldn't make it tonight.

Alright. Thank you for that. Colleagues, questions or comments? Discussion. Alright. This one's laying on the table to recommend approval. But don't go anywhere, manager Malik. We got you for one more. It's our eleventh agenda item, ID number 25Dash1741. Mayor requesting approval to accept and expend a $307 gift from the Tufts University softball team to the Health and Human Services Mobile Farmers Market revolving fund for market needs. And once again, manager Malik.

True, Cher. This donation was provided to us from Tufts softball team. They raised the money, in the play that they did. This is going to get deposited into Somerville Mobile Farmers Market account. However, the current restriction as it stands allows us to only use utilize the fund for the state ABT reimbursement and cash sales.

This is a sum of Somerville Mobile's farmers market fund that kicks in every July till October during the summer months with preparations starting in June and ending in November. So this donation was sort of to support their wishes towards this this work, and so we are seeking approval to to deposit and utilize these funds for the next, season, basically.

Alright. Big thank you to the tub the Tufts University softball team for, for raising some money for a worthy cause. Any discussion? Alright. Items laid on the table. Recommend approval. And thank you, manager Malik, for hanging out with us tonight. Next up, twelfth agenda item, ID number 25Dash1740. So they request approval to accept and expend a $22,570 grant with no new match required from the executive office of public safety and security to police department for mobile data terminals. And I see we have, director Emily Wisdom from the police department with us. Director Wisdom.

Good evening. This is a pretty straightforward grant request. This is this particular money comes to us to us through the state, through the Byrne Memorial Justice program, that for law enforcement. This year, we requested, we actually requested five mobile data terminals, we're approved to be able to buy three with that, 22,570. A mobile data terminal, for anybody who doesn't know, is the, the computers that are in the Cruisers. So this will allow us to update a few of those that are that are older and replace those with, three new ones.

Alright. Thank you for that. And just to be clear, this is not one of those, UOSI grants that we've been scanning for so carefully in terms of language, required to accept that obligations on the city that we would not agree with. Correct?

Yeah. That's correct. So this was it has been through through the application process was through the mayor and the the law team, to apply. And then, again, when we accepted, this went through the law team and the mayor's office again for accept accept for acceptance. It is the Byrne Memorial Justice, program, not USC. That is correct. Thank you, chair.

State program. Correct?

It it so it's coming to us through the state, but it is it is funded with federal money. That is true.

Alright. I appreciate that. I see councilor Scott has a question followed by councilor Burnley. Of course.

Yeah. Thank you, mister chair. Through you, you know, having reviewed the application, you know, and there's a lot of talk in there about how the Summerville Housing Authority PD doesn't have any mobile data terminals in their cruisers. They've got two cruisers and and no terminals. So I'm just curious since only a subset of what we asked for was funded, are we anticipating supplying those SHA cruisers or PDTs or updating some of SPDs? Wow. That was a lot of letters. My apologies.

No. That's alright. I believe that the three that that that were funded are intended for the SPD. Although, I can double check with the chief and and let you know if you would like me to formally provide a memo.

I mean, it just seems like, you know, we've got a choice to up upgrade the SPDs versus getting anything at all in those SHA Cruisers. So it's a just a curious question. But, obviously, setting policy and directing where the minute details of these funds go is a function of the director of the department, the chief, and the, the executive. So, I'm all set, mister chair. Appreciate it.

Alright. And councilor Burley, you still hands down now, I think. Did did you have a question still?

Councilor Scott had was had a question along similar lines.

Alright. Thanks. Councilor Mabaugh, you're next up.

No. Just to, thank you, mister chair. I just wanted to echo, doctor Wisdom's statement. I think when as soon as she she said it was pretty straightforward, actually put my eagle eye on it and realized that it was actually straightforward. So thank you. I'm all set.

Here's for straightforwardness. Alright. Not seeing any additional discussion. The items laid on the table to oh, wait. Our committee clerks have maybe an update on what to do about our agenda.

And Yes. Gonna leave this one

on the table to recommend approval then. Perfect. And, yes, clerk?

Yes. I've been in communication with the city clerk, and, these two items, item seven and eight, are duplicates of twenty and twenty one. And so were we expecting a different specific item in place of these?

Yes. There were two other items. Those are the ones that were were sent to to be on the I guess, you know what? Here's one for go check your agenda and make sure the items you sent in to be on the agenda are on the agenda. Not to throw anyone under the bus here, but yeah. No. There were two items that were included that were supposed to be on this agenda that aren't. So we'll have to just go figure out how to you know, obviously, here, we're facing the end of the end of the session, in terms of the Thursday night's meeting. So we'll have to figure out how to get those out of committee and get those taken up on Thursday night.

Let me

quickly clarify this with them. They're saying that these items were listed twice on, the email to

the city

clerks and not other items potentially. So let me clarify that. As for these items, we'll just take a vote on one set of them and not both, but I'll confirm about those other items.

So so 17 so 25Dash1745 and 25Dash1746, were included. I'm looking at the email. And somehow, you know, human error, we ended up with these other two duplicated in place of those two where they should be on the agenda.

Okay. Our our city clerk Kim is, saying that as for the missing items, that would would need to be addressed on Thursday, unfortunately. Yep. And so we'll just address one set of these items for now.

That makes sense. Makes total sense. Thanks for clarifying that. I appreciate that. We will proceed with that plan.

Perfect.

Alright. That is going to bring us to our thirteenth agenda item, ID number 25Dash1737. Or, did you have a question on that?

I just I just wanted to say, you know, I appreciate everybody trying to straighten it out. I, I think we'll be able to discharge those two items and approve them at Thursday's meeting with no problem. And, honestly, you've got a lot on your plate. If, a couple agenda items are the only things to slide in this transition, I'm gonna count us all very, very grateful and, and lucky. I I did just wanna say it.

As we let that last item go, and I do I do support recommending approval on that grant, I just, reread the application again. And so much of the justification of the application came from the extreme need of folks down in the Mystics. And, you know, the folks that are served by the Somerville Housing Authority, we we hear over and over again, and, actually, we see it in the the statistics. You know, Ward 2 doesn't call for SPD nearly as much as, as, you know, some of the some of the other boards, some of the other areas in the city. It it does kinda I have a hard time just sitting on the fact that having received only a portion of these funds, that we're not directing those to the place where I think arguably, they're most needed.

So I I hope and, you know, again, it ain't over till it's over, mister chair, but, I would hope, this comment at least would direct the administration to reconsider, where those terminals go. If we can only get them into one place, I'd I'd much rather they go into the SHA Cruisers rather than upgrading our SPD. But that's just my mischief. I just had a hard time letting it go at night. I appreciate your indulgence.

Absolutely.

Mister chair?

Councilor Scott or sorry. Councilor Mabaugh. Councilor Scott just spoke.

Yeah. I share councilor Scott's sentiment, so I just wanna put that on the record that everything he said, you know, I concur. Thank you.

Alright. Thank you both. Alright. We are up to agenda item 13, ID number 25Dash1737. The mayor requesting approval to accept a gift of real property located at 17 Innerbelt Road, also 9 New Washington Street, from Ralph c DeVito junior and a Bram Trustee RCD Foundation. I see we have, attorney Kathy Lester Selkert from the law department with us, as well as executive director Tom Galigani from OSPCD. Who wants to talk about this one? Attorney Salkert, maybe?

I can certainly get us started, mister chair. So this is real property that right now is called the Ralph and Jenny Center. The name of the donor is the property owner. It is a trust. And there the trustee is an attorney who wants to retire.

So he's trying to and this was in the the terms of the trust that this property be donated to the city for the purpose of maintaining a property a location for the Council on Aging, I believe. And Tom has more of the details about it. Just just as far as the address goes, the assessors carry it as 17 Interbelt Road, but it's commonly known as 9 Washington Street. New Washington Street. Sorry. And Tyler

Thank you for that.

Yep. Go ahead.

Alright. Discussion on this. I see councilor Klingon has something. Councilor Klingon.

Yeah. Thank you, mister Chirith. I mean, this is really exciting. Like, this is for us. Like, we're gonna they're giving this to us.

Yeah.

So, I mean, you know, I am curious if Tom knows, but, you know, for the longest time, my previous life, when I did a lot of organizing around addiction, I used to hold the Massachusetts organizing for addiction recovery more. We used to the Lions Club will let us use the space up there. So I know the space above the Council on Aging's downstairs space. And I'm curious, is is the Lions Club still in there, and and what does their lease look like?

Mister chairman, through the chair, we if we agree to accept this gift, it is the holiday season, so I would encourage you to accept this gift. It's in the it's in the holiday spirit. We will also be we're currently the city is one of five tenants in the complex. The complex includes two separate buildings and an adjacent yard space. The the Lions Club is on the 2nd Story of the building that is a little bit along New Washington Street.

The building on the corner is fully occupied by the New England Home for Little Wanderers. It has an office space there. The yard storage has two different tenants, Tito's Towing. And let me check one more second.

So what would be the city what would the through you, mister chair, what would the city be getting? Just the 1st Floor of the Jenny Lynn Center Building?

Through the chair, the city would be gifted the entire complex, including both buildings and roughly 34,000 square feet of land area. So we would, in essence, be we would directly become landlords of those other tenants for the time being.

Wow. Okay. Cool. Yeah. I mean, you know, I'm obviously my I don't wanna seem like my my brains, you know, popping off with all these potential ideas. I mean, like, there are you know, I frequent the dog park over there. I know Tito's, the the the the auto body place, and the old bank is now the little. So, yeah, naturally, you know, we wouldn't wanna mess with that, but the potential for even just, you know, the yard even if we want yeah. I don't know. I just like, there's lot of that's that's a great great thing for the city to inherit from these folks.

So, hopefully, you know, doesn't it's not a boondoggle in any way like some other properties that we've, you know, inherited or sorry, acquired. But very exciting. So, yeah, absolutely great. Thank you.

So many questions. Yes. Councilor Mabal followed by councilor Brin Thank

you, chair Wilson. You know, I think only in Cameroon that you have such a thing as a free lunch. Since I came to The US, you know, I so there's no such thing as free lunch. So I'm just curious as, you know, what are like, what is it that we don't know? Like, I mean, like, just so yeah.

Just what is it that, you know, they because, again, there's no like, I I it just I mean, it just strikes me. You know? It's exciting, but at the same time, I want us to understand, like, all the if there's something on the line, you know, that we need to be aware of.

Yeah. That's a great question. And we've been in contact with the trustee, the managing trustee attorney Bram for about a year and a half who has signaled that he's ready to retire as as attorney mentioned. And so we've been working with him for some period of time to give us a chance to completely understand what we're getting into. What what is this gift truly?

And so we've done the very typical stuff that one would do when acquiring a piece of property. We're did we're doing a title search. We've done an environmental a phase one environmental site assessment and have talked to each of the tenants to get a sense of what's going on. We also connected our DPW team to speak with mister Bram, attorney Bram, and to go through the building to get an understanding of what will be inheriting, what kind of systems are in place, the HVAC system, the electrical system. And they were allowed to do a a fairly quick assessment of the condition of the building, and it's in good shape.

It's not brand new, but DPW didn't identify any obvious problems with the building. So like any building, any old building, we're gonna have to maintain it. In the near term, we've got some tenants paying some rent, so we're gonna be able to manage this at least as well as attorney Bram has been managing this on behalf of the the foundation. The environmental site assessment came up surprisingly clean. I'm not gonna say it's totally clean.

This is typical urban fill. Again, this is a site that has experienced probably a hundred and fifty years of development, rail yards in the in the in the past, and it the site of an urban renewal plan about an implementation plan about forty to forty five years ago. But, the environmental site assessment said, yeah, it's basically in good shape given that's an industrial site and a commercial site, and, you don't have much to

be worried about. Mister chair, can I just jump in real quick just to speak if I could to councilor and Bob's point?

Councilor, it's on this point?

Yeah. Yeah. The piece that I think that the director is missing is that the rub is as far as what I heard in Rumerville back in the day is that Ralph and Jenny Lynn, the the whole crux of the entire complex, but mainly the reason for the gifting to the city is to, as far as I know, make sure that the council on aging has a home in perpetuity. That's, like, the linchpin of the whole thing. Everything outside of that is my my understanding is just, you know, gravy. But, essentially, that is the unless I'm wrong, but that is the, I guess, the rub, if you will.

It it's slightly nuanced. The foundation was set up ultimately to benefit the city for some sort of public health or health reason. And you could define health many different ways. At some point in the past, the city was able to move in the Ralph and Jenny Center. Again, the Ralph and Jenny Center, I don't believe was an original tenant, but I could be wrong.

So it's been there, and that's been the the benefit of the foundation is to allow the in the in the last couple decades, it's been to allow the senior center to occupy that space rent free. And as attorney Bram has thought about dissolving the trust or dissolving the foundation, he realizes and recognizes and that the bylaws of the of the foundation maintain that it needs to continue to benefit the city and

from a

a health perspective. So the thought was to donate the land, the entire property. That way, the Ralph and Jenny Center could continue to operate there for as long as we wanted to be there. And that's once he get as I understand it, once he gifts the property to the city and, in essence, dissolves the trust and I'm not a lawyer, so I I might be using technical terms inappropriately. But once the trust is exhausted, then he'll have met the the goal of the trust. And but we own the property free and clear. I don't believe we'll have any use restrictions or any kind of limitations on using the property in the in the future.

You good, counselor? Counselor Klain, you're you're good with that thing on that point?

Yeah. I I was just trying to add to that backstory of how it came to be. Like Gotcha. That's

all. Gotcha. Counselor Mabal, you all finished. Can we jump to councilor Brown?

Director Gargan, and thank you, councilor Klingon, for substantiating the question.

Alright. Councilor Burnley followed by councilor Scott.

Through the chair, I just briefly want to double down on councilor Klingon's original, comments. The the city has, had some difficulties being a landlord in during my tenure at this certainly. And I I think a significant element there has been its relationship with tenants. Now the fact that this building has multiple tenants, including those that are beyond the city itself, I I think is very notable. And I would just encourage this administration and the next administration to work proactively with those tenants as to the future of this building, and how we can best serve the city and the public.

And, to be clear, the city and the public are different things, and sometimes might have different, needs. So just wanted to note that.

Hear. Hear. Councilor Scott.

Yeah. Thank you, mister chair. I think my concerns are similar to my colleagues. You know, we've received gifts of property. We've received a gift of two houses on Allen Street right here in Union Square, and the only purpose the city has put those to was just to use them as a practice space for police clearance drills.

You know, I I do also acknowledge the not great track record the city has had as a landlord, recently for third parties, and even how the city has handled buildings that were, you know, obtained for the for the purpose of the city. We heard even earlier tonight about how a department, in parks and rec, right, has been, relocated several times throughout the city. So, I I certainly appreciate the gift a 100%. I guess, it is my fervent wish for the upcoming administration to work at the city council, but also to work in careful awareness of the original purpose, of the Ralph and Jenny Center and and make sure that we we continue that, in its existing location. So that's all I wanted to say, sir.

Appreciate it.

Thanks, counselor Scott. And I'll just say I'm I'm in the habit lately of talking about opportunities for improvement. I think this is a good opportunity for us to show that, you know, we've learned lessons from from the armory and, you know, to do better and to do to do right by by people. I'm I'm excited about this opportunity. So seeing no further discussion on this one, the item is laid on the table to recommend approval.

That is going to bring us to, let's see, our fourteenth agenda item. That's ID number 25Dash1728. Mayor requesting approval of a utility easement for NSTAR Electric Company at 0 Windsor Place, Boynton Yards. Once again, attorney Salkert.

Thank you, mister chair. This is for a very small area, a 100 approximately a 150 square feet, and the best, picture of it is on page nine of the easement document. There's a plan, and it's a very small parcel. As you can see, it goes over Windsor Place, and it's part of a line of electricity that's going through 600 Windsor. There's already a private NSTAR easement there for for electricity on the top part of the the northern part of the plan.

And this is just a little strip of land owned by the SRA that will probably be part of a street at some point, and that the SRA may very well convey to the city at some point. But right now, NSTAR needs the easement in order to to run their electric lines through that site. And it's the terms are are similar identical to the easement that was approved for 51 Prospect, the substation that was used as a model. Even though it's a small space, all of the same similar terms are in this easement.

Thanks for that, Theresa. Did you what did you say the square footage of that was?

I I'm showing a 156 square feet, so it's really small. Okay. It's like, yeah, six by 25 feet on the two sides, and then the length is 25 feet on one end and 30 on the other. It's really small.

Okay. That's more than a 150 square feet, I think. But

Maybe it's maybe you have to

add in Yeah. Sorry. 32. Yeah. To be overly Yeah. No. It's a relatively small one.

I yeah.

There's Just sorry. Just trying to get square numbers there.

200 square feet. There we go. Plus or minus.

Alright. Thanks for clarifying that. Councilor Scott.

Yeah. Thanks, miss Cherry. This is just a, I mean, this is a mod swing worth of sidewalk, that's part of making sure that we get access for the GSEP, the Greater Cambridge Energy Project that Eversource is bringing in lines, from their new transform substation down in Kendall, up to here. So, I don't see any problem with this as the ward council recommend approval.

Alright. Well, if the word counselor is supporting this, I have no problem with it. Any other discussion on this? Alright. The items laid on the table to recommend approval. Attorney Salgret, thank you so much.

Thank you, mister chair. Thanks, everyone. Have a good night.

Alright. That's gonna bring us to our fifteenth agenda item, ID number 25Dash1697. The mayor requesting approval of transfer of a $150 from the Office of Immigrant Affairs Neighborhood Improvement Council account to the Summerall Public Schools food services account for the Latin American and Caribbean heritage celebration. This is a very small dollar figure. Hopefully, got a chance to look at this, but if there's any discussion on it, we'll entertain that right now.

I'll just say while I'm waiting for that, that was a very good event. I enjoyed that, and I appreciate people putting that on. I don't see any discussions, so the item is laid on the table to recommend approval. And now our sixteenth agenda item, ID number 25Dash1733. That's the mayor requesting approval to pay prior year invoices totaling a $147.86 using available funds the Department of Health and Human Services program supplies and materials account for meeting snacks.

Folks, it's a 187 or $147.86 item. Any discussion? Items laid on table to recommend approval. See, manager Malik was ready just in case. I trust those were good meeting snacks. Alright. That's thanks for being here, though, manager Malik. Alright. Now, folks, we have some cleanup to do here. End of the year.

It's our final finance committee meeting of the year, which means we have some orders that people submitted. These were taken up. I think all all of them were taken up. We had discussion about them. We kept them in committee in case there were further updates, in case, you know, the the situation changed, anything substantive came up.

The only one that might not have been taken up as I think about it was one from councilor Burnley about the, financial implications of public safety for all. I think that one may never have been fully just because the timing of of bringing in the public safety for all task force person. Anyway, IGA is here. I would I would temper your expectations in terms of you know, from talking to IGA, there are no grand big updates on this. There can be just some basic things, but, you know, this was us doing I wanted to make sure that these got brought before us at the final meeting of the year as opposed to just letting them expire in committee.

So, just wanted the table set a little, and and appreciate IGA going along with this just so we can give some some closure here. Obviously, these can all be resubmitted by next year's council, you know, if we want to to follow-up on this, but just wanted to, you know, wanted to have some closure here. So, clerk, I'm gonna just start reading these in. We're gonna start with ID, with seventeenth agenda item ID number 25Dash1677. That is a resolution in support of the Massachusetts Water Resource Authority committing additional resources to stormwater management. Legislative liaison, was there any update? Actually, councilor Scott, did you have something on this, or you wanna see if there's an update?

I just wanted to check-in because my impression was the resolution was approved with a copy for discussion sent here. Is that is that correct?

That's what I remembered. Did people wanna I guess, I'll give people the opportunity to talk about it. You know, there's not you know, do people we already had a subsequent presentation in here after, after that initial present the initial presentation that came up in here. If people wanna have anything they wanna say about it, councilor Bob

wanna make sure that we approved the resolution and sent a copy to the state delegation, sir. That's all. You know, otherwise, I'd move for approval, although this is sent for discussion as well.

Discussion. Yeah. We're just here if people wanna discuss it, I'm happy to to to have discussion of it.

Nope. Thank you, mister Chair. Just wanna make sure we didn't, miss a trick.

We did not. I don't believe. But fair asking that question here tonight given the agenda wildness we've seen. So, councilor Mubaugh, this was your item as I recall. No. It was councilor Yun Campan's, or was he anyway, councilor Mubaugh.

It doesn't matter, mister chair. We jointly submitted this.

That's right.

But but there's nothing to discuss further about this.

I didn't think so. So, well, there. That's the discussion right there. So unless there's anything else, we're gonna mark this one as work completed, clerk. Now we're gonna take up, or take the agenda item, item number 25 dash zero two five four. That's an order by council Burnley that the chief of police present to this council the financial implications of the public safety for all recommendations, specifically the cost to fund additional officers, acquire and utilize body cameras, implement a co response model. Legislative liaison Hunter.

Thank you, mister chair, and the three of to the committee. I have just a brief update on this. This item was last on the an agenda, I think, in the spring just before we hired our public safety for all project our program manager. That person is onboarded now and has been working diligently over the summer and the fall, to meet with staff to understand what how to build out this sustainable next steps for implementation of the public safety for all task force recommendations. Those conversations have included funding, how that would be, funded, and both the midterm and long term, with both the, city's current resources or with, potential external funding sources.

There are no, conclusions at this time. They're still working on that. So conversations are ongoing, but that work, is happening now, and we're excited to get the results of all of the that conversation in the New Year.

Alright. Thanks for that. Any discussion by the committee? And councilor Burnley, if you wanna Councilor Burnley first followed by councilor Scott.

Thank you. Through the chair, please excuse my voice. I'm a bit hoarse at a at a very talkative weekend. And so I first would like to say, please do not confuse my submittal of this item for support for the contents of the item. As my colleagues know, there have been multiple, multiple, studies, task force that have been created and proposed and executed, in recent years relating to, public safety as well as, officer staffing.

And I would say, quite frankly, some of those, recommendations have come at the exact opposite of each other. We've had recommendations that say we can have less patrol officers and by restructuring our model. We've had recommendations that say we should have alternative emergency response and not repeat, not co response model, and we've had others that have contradicted those. I simply, through, submitting this item, wanted to have a better sense of what the financial implications were for the public safety for all recommendations. And although I will not be getting that in this meeting, I encourage a memo be sent to the next council with that more specific details on that, particularly around the co response model and the utilization of body cameras, which some of my colleagues will remember previous council rejected during budget season and, you know, urge for further legislative action before adoption of these.

So although we do wanna have clarity on, the financial implications in this meeting, I still encourage, counselors to seek that and to ponder, one, how best those ones can be used, and two, which recommendations from the various, studies and task force that, have been created, we should be moving forward with. Thank you.

Thank you, counselor. Counselor Scott.

No. I just wanted to, express my gratitude for the item and and, my very clear intention to keep following up on these items with the, new administration, mister Marilek. I think we're I I have hopes, high hopes for the future, and look forward to continuing this conversation. If we need to submit another item and bring, those conversations to the public, happy to do so.

Heard, chef. Okay. Seeing no further discussion on this, that item is marked work completed. And that's gonna bring up our nineteenth agenda item, item number 25 dash zero six four nine, that the director of intergovernmental affairs coordinate with department heads to assess which federal grants are likely to not be available in f y twenty twenty six and discuss with this council the potential impact on programs and services. Once again, legislative liaison, Hunter, any update on this one?

Thank you, mister chair. As every member of this council is aware, federal funding has been tumultuous over the course of this year. A lot of those impacts have been felt by nonprofits, institutes of higher education or research organizations, less on the local government side in terms of grants that have been frozen, canceled, the the, impacts the local governments have felt has been a lot of delays. So at this time, we don't have confirmation of any funds being canceled or frozen, but that the process has been delayed. And recent, furloughs of staff or reduction in federal staffing have only added to those delays.

So there are several grants that we, compared to previous years, you have a particular cycle. We've seen that process really stretch out from when the notice of applications or, funding opportunity is posted, when, contracts are worked on, when award letters are happening, and even when funds are dispersed. So we're continuing to monitor that situation that could put us in a place for some of our grants, where we don't see any dollars in fiscal year twenty six because of how much it's been delayed. And that will obviously mean delay of projects in which those funds are seeking to fund. But at this time, we're continuing to be in a monitoring situation and do not think there will be any, currently, there are any, cancellation of funds.

So it's hard to know what the impacts will be, but at this current time, this is where we're at. We're in sort of a delayed mode.

And I'm gonna guess the, recent government shutdown did not help matters in terms of trying to get answers as that I know that resulted in some grant application deadlines being extended as a result of that.

That is correct. Added further delays.

Alright. I appreciate that update. Councilor Brinley.

Thank you, chair. Gonna keep straining myself here, through you. Before I get I I have, like, a a specific question, and I have a broader table setting or comment specifically through you to the direct to director. Yeah. To the liaison other.

There we go. So we I know that there were some concerns around specifically the math some mass stock grants that would impact, McGrath Highway. Is are we clear about the the distribution of those funds and the ability to execute on that project?

Through the chair, thank you for that question. I failed to note that we the state has also, which serves as, a pass through for a lot of federal dollars, has also seen significant delays. So they are sort of experiencing similar funding uncertainty that the local governments are are experiencing. For McGrath, my understanding from the most recent briefing I had on that project, it's moving forward as planned. There are challenges with program projects like that that are, you know, multiple years out in funding. So there's a lot of opportunity for things to go arrive, but at this time, it's moving forward as as planned.

Alright. Thank you. Now that obviously, through the share, that project's one that, will help reshape the way that our neighbors and, constituents move around this community. It is a great importance, I think, to our residents. And, frankly, it it is one that is, more friendly to to those of us who do not, drive cars, and that that has been a point of contention at the federal level, in recent year.

But more broadly, I brought this item forward because, certainly, our our community has seen the impact of the tax on our federal grants, whether that's through programs like Head Starts, or on the city side, programs and services, especially through HHS. And I, again, would just encourage my colleagues to keep a fur eye on some of these programs that are most impactful for our residents and about providing, whether direct resources to them and life saving resources, in particular. But I'll hold off and and deal to my colleagues to speak more.

Thanks, counselor. Counselor Scott.

Thank you, miss Chair. Just to my colleague's point there, since it was mentioned, and I apologize if this was mentioned before, but there is, in fact, a public design hearing on the McGrath project happening right now. So probably for another half hour after we get out of this. I'm looking forward to it. Thank you, mister chairman.

Thank you. And I'll say this is also you know, this is you know, obviously, we care about this just for the sake of the the budget, but, also, you know, we're sitting here thinking about potentially borrowing against, future can we develop a block grant, receipts from the federal government, you know, to do some of the work at, at Clarendon Hill. Right? And so ensuring that we're actually gonna get those becomes really important. Right? So, on many levels. Yes. So this was, I appreciate this order. Any other discussion with this? Council Burnley, you had additional things you wanted to to share, this is a great time to jump in with those as well.

Not to push

on this one. That piece.

Alright. Alright. Seeing no further discussion, we're gonna mark this one as work completed as well. And I'm gonna take up then the final three items together as they're very much related. That's ID number 25Dash1445 in order by councilor Burnley, that the city solicited up to this council on the new immigrations and customs enforcement operation cooperation requirements attached to the forthcoming urban area security initiative grants.

And '24 or 25Dash1446 ordered by council brilliant, the chief of police, or the Metro Boston homeland security region representative up to this council on the strategy for applying the urban area security initiative or any other federal grants applying sorry. Applying for those grants. The the required immigration and customs enforcement cooperation as well as 25Dash1515. That is a public communication for Crystal Hub submitting comments regarding items number 25Dash1445 and 25Dash1446, orders regarding immigration, customs enforcement, and ShotSpotter. So we're gonna take the three of these up. Legislative liaison hunter.

Thank you, mister chair. And through you, the update here is that we are still waiting on the state. They are in the structure for UWATC. They are the applicants to the federal government, and they will, be the sort the distributor of the funds. If they are accepted and dispersed to the state, then they can go out to the, participating communities.

So we're waiting to hear about the agreement between the state and the federal government. There was a meeting planned for December, but that has been postponed until January of the of UOSI. So we expect an update in the new year on what steps the state is taking, and then we can make a decision as a city from there. So no update at the

Alright. Thank you for that. Colleagues. Here's what I'll say on this. When signing any of these things, any these grant applications, any acceptances, that's where I think it's gonna be really important that the law department and the mayor, whoever that is, are really, really running a fine tooth comb over these obligations that we're potentially signing up for and making sure that we're not agreeing to anything that's out of step with our values as a community.

I'll commit to making sure that that's happening, and I think we need to stay on top of this. And I'll also commit to making sure that, this council stays updated on any changes that do come in. Yeah. Any other discussion? Alright. We're gonna mark the three of these as work completed then, and that's gonna bring us to the end of tonight's agenda. Clerk, could you please call the roll on recommending approval of everything laid on the table, for a recommendation to approve? And if you don't mind, please tell us those item numbers of what we are voting on here.

Yes. Also, I have confirmed with the clerks again just to set the record straight. The items, for tonight's agenda were properly submit submitted. There was just an issue on the back end with creating the agenda this evening. So at the council meeting on Thursday, you'll be able to suspend the rules to address those important items. But as of now, unfortunately, we can't discuss those. Yeah.

Exonerated. Alright. Thank you for that. Yeah. If you please read the the item numbers of what we are voting on.

Yes. Of course. So this is to recommend approval of items number one, two, three, four, five, six, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen. Councilor Mbaugh?

Yes.

Councilor Burnley?

Aye.

Councilor Klingen?

Yes.

Councilor Scott?

Yes.

Chair Wilson?

Yes.

Okay. With all votes in favor, it is seven thirty two. So we are adjourned, and we'll be recommending approval of those items.

Sorry, clerk. I we didn't move to adjourn yet. So sorry.

So I'm recommending approval of those just

wanted to just before we adjourn, I just wanted to say quickly, this is our final finance committee, of the year. For for me, it's my final finance committee ever. I really enjoyed chairing this committee for four years. I wanna thank you all for the work that you did. You know how much work we did on this committee.

This committee met more than any other committee over that time. We processed more items than any other committee during that time. We do the work. So, I wanna thank vice chair Scott for all the all the all the wisdom, all the for so many times saving us from, from doing something boneheaded, especially that first year when I was learning the ropes and figuring out how to dispose of items. Just really, really invaluable.

Really, really appreciate you for that. You know, to everyone who served on on finance, you know, over those years, you know, it this you know, you all gave up a lot of your Junes to do budget season, and it, you know, it's a big deal. And and I just really appreciate it. I hope the public appreciates how much, you all gave, and, just really, really appreciate you serving on finance here with me. So, yeah, that's all I had to say. With that, councilor Scott moves to adjourn.

On the motion, mister chair, I just wanna say, don't say it's your last one ever. You're ruling out a future comeback run as a councilor once you're done with mayor.

Never say never.

Mister chair?

Councilor Mubar.

Yes. On that editorial, I wanna, you know, just echo the sentiment of, you know, councilor Scott as well. So I appreciate the work and, your dedication to, you know, this committee. Thank you.

Thank you. Alright. Clerk, call the roll, please.

Great work, everyone. On adjournment. Councilor Bah?

Yes, please.

Councilor Burnley?

Yes.

Councilor Klingen?

Yes.

Councilor Scott?

Yes, please.

Chair Wilson?

Yes, please.

Alright. 07:34, and we are adjourned. Thanks, everyone.

Thanks, everyone.

Thank you.