Public Health and Public Safety Committee - Regular Meeting

I now declare this meeting of the public health and safety meeting in order. Please note, pursuant to an act, we will record all this information and put it on the city website. Clerk, please call the roll.

All right, this is Councilor Streisand. Councilor Klingon.

Present.

Chair McLaughlin.

Yeah.

All right, with that, we have two members present, so we do have quorum, and it is 6.33.

Please note that Councilor Streza is chairing her own committee meeting right now. She may meet us later. Let me see if... Could we see if Councilor Saeed is in the audience? And if she is, could we upgrade her to a panelist so that she can discuss this item with us? Do you see that, Madam Clerk?

Yep, I just upgraded her. It looks like there are two of her, but I upgraded both of them.

One is enough. Yes, thank you. Could you read the first item?

Yes, and do we want to take up the minutes first or the one that you mentioned?

Yes, we'll take up the minutes first.

All right, item number one, ID number 25-1709, approval of the minutes of the Public Health and Public Safety Committee meeting of October 30th, 2025.

Seeing no discussion, those minutes are approved.

And did you want to do the vote altogether at the end or do that now?

Yeah, I will lay it on the table for approval. Thank you.

Okay, perfect. So next one, next minutes.

Yes, we'll lay that on the table for approval as well. No discussion. Unless there's discussion, which I don't see any.

Okay, so that's just to read into the record. Item number two, ID number 25-1855. Approval of the minutes of the Rodent Issues Special Committee Meeting of December 1st, 2025.

Any discussion? RIP Rodent Commission? Seeing none, those minutes are laid on the table for approval.

And so this item right here, item number four, is the one we want to take up next?

Yes, please.

Great. Item number four. Oh, sorry. Did someone say something?

Yeah, I think someone's unmuted. Everyone, please mute yourselves if you're not speaking.

All right. Item number four, ID number 26-0972, sent for discussion by Councilor Saeed, McLaughlin, and Bach, that the administration address the ongoing public health and safety concerns at the Broadway Salvation Army site.

All right. Councilor Saeed, would you like to open up with this one? Sure. Uh-oh. There's two of you. Is it an echo?

Yeah.

Are you there, Councilor?

Can you keep the other one?

I think the issue is that you might have the site opened on two separate pages because we got a little echo. But I can speak to this while you figure that out because I'm aware. Oh, there we go.

now there you go uh thank you uh through the chair we appreciate you uh recognizing me um yes i would like to uh introduce this item um so we have said this during the council meeting when i introduced uh when i submitted this item uh multiple constituents have reached out to me some have reached out to both myself and counselor mclaughlin about the situation at the Salvation Army. I know the situation has been going on for a few years, and SPD has intervened a few times. It's just lately this is becoming a real public health and safety issue. This area is becoming an overnight gathering place. There are ongoing issues involving loud arguments in the middle of the night. There are fights happening. There's public drinking, public urination. A lot of these also are happening in driveways. There are butters to this area. to the Salvation Army, they're dealing with this. And there's also theft. There's organized resale of donated goods. So apparently from what abutters have observed is that these are the same folks who are coming every night, removing goods that are intended for residents in need and taking them and selling them somewhere else. Yeah, it's the same vehicles that are, you know, coming. So clearly this is getting out of control now. And I appreciate Chief Benford, who has been trying to look into this. And I understand that this area, the front... is in Somerville, the back is in Medford. We can talk about that. But I would like us to, so a lot of these things were shared with me and with maybe the chair, maybe with Casa McLaughlin as well, but I would like us to have this discussion here in committee and have a chance to ask questions and come up with a plan.

Thank you. Are there any representatives from the city who are prepared to speak on this? So I'm on my phone because my computer is not working. So I see Chief Donovan, Deputy Chief Donovan. If you would like to speak, you have the floor.

Yes, Deputy Chief James Donovan speaking on behalf of the police department. I'm sorry. I don't know if you can see my video. I have it on, but I'm not showing it on my computer. So I apologize if you cannot see my face tonight. And that noise earlier when you guys were reading the minutes was my son screaming because he wants Senegal to lose to the Knights of Belgium. So I had to quiet him down. Okay. As for as for through the chair to the council, say, yeah, we got the communication. We had this problem last year, similar problem. It's not, you know, interestingly enough, I spoke with the representatives at the Salvation Army. It's not necessarily all theft. A lot of it's dumping, illegal dumping. Um, people are doing house cleanouts and they think that people are just dumping the things they can't sell at the Salvation Army. So I think it's a combination of some theft, uh, but also a lot of dumping too, which, which draws, which draws a lot of people as well. Um, you know, interestingly enough, last Wednesday night, I was driving home from my son's basketball game in East Somerville, uh, And I caught people in there. So I reached out to the PD and the supervisor came down, identified the people that were in there and just put them on notice that they can't be there. We have, you know, as of last year, I met with the district manager, Mr. Tierney, and made some environmental suggestions that may help us. You know, as far as the police department goes, this is a multifaceted problem. It's not just a police problem. There's an ISD issue here and other things. But, you know, we spoke last year and I said, you know, if you had cameras there, we can only be there so much. And I said, if you had installed cameras, it may help us identify the theft and the dumping using your license plates and so forth and maybe catch the people that are doing it. And, you know, if we can take a big bite out of that, maybe word will spread. At the time, he thought that was a great idea. You know, we walked away. We didn't have any complaints. We had Director of Patrol there at the time. You know, so, you know, but then this popped up again this year in June and July. And I think a lot of it is somebody mentioned moving season. You know, June is moving season for the students, May and June. And that's really a lot of dumping there. So I reached out to Mr. Tierney again, but apparently Mr. Tierney has since retired. I spoke to Stanley Wiens. He's now the representative for the area for Salvation Army. We are going to meet. We're going to set up a meeting between myself and one of my colleagues. coworkers to see if we can address some of the dumping and the theft. But I was a little frustrated talking to Mr. Means today. I said, he's like, what can you do for me? I said, well, you have to help yourself as well. You're on a business. What are you going to do as a business owner to assist us in helping you? And he really didn't have much for me. The cameras that I asked to be installed last year had never been installed. He says he's asking corporate if they'll authorize the funds to do that. I get the territorial or the property problem they have. There is a house in back that has an easement to access their house. So they can't close that gate altogether. But they could do better with signage. They could do better with putting up some fencing there around their donation box. They could put better lighting out there that wouldn't necessarily bother the neighbors, but would light up like a motion lighting or lighting that comes on on a timer at nighttime. There are a lot of environmental things that I recommended that they haven't undertaken yet. So like I said, we have done directed patrol there. I ran the numbers today. In the month of June alone, we've been there 75 times for directed patrols. And those are directed patrols only on the evening shifts and the overnights because during the day, they're open and no one's doing dumping or theft. It's happening after they close in the evening. So our directed patrols have been in the evenings and the overnight shifts. Like I said, we've done 75 of them. On one of the 75... you know, it's like shooting fish in a barrel. You know, we, we go by, we drive to the parking lot and, and, you know, you know, the officers are on notice. That's an important issue for the neighborhood. But again, you know, we can go by a thousand times and we may get one person near one time. And that, that did happen last week for me when I was driving by and called the supervisor down. So as far as the police department goes, we have stepped up about patrols of the area. Um, I did contact the management again to see what they can do to help us. Um, You know, as far as lighting goes, as far as cameras goes and so forth. He was very amenable to have a meeting. I think he's new in the position. He said, Mr. Chan, he recently retired. So we are going to set up a meeting if the counselor or both counselors want to be involved. I can do that in the evenings. It's convenient with you guys. Or we can just have, you know, representatives in the police department, maybe ISD, attend a meeting with the management and try to come to a collaborative solution for this neighborhood problem. But I would say if any of your constituents call us, have them call 911. I know it's not a life or death emergency, but You know, if they call us on the business line, you know, it's going to get treated as a business call. And if they call 911, they're more likely to get an immediate response. So I would encourage them because if they have people out there, we'd like to go out there, identify them. You know, if it's a repeat offender, if it's someone, you know, who we deem necessary to make an arrest, we can make an arrest. But it's a difficult place to make an arrest because there is the egress for that house back there. So there is, you know, somewhat of a legal issue. ability for someone to access that parking lot. So it's not necessarily private, in quotation marks, parking lot. It is a private, semi-private, but also public access to the house back there. So it is kind of a sticky situation. Sorry for my long-winded response. I hope that was helpful.

Thank you very much. Is there any discussion from the committee? And please just speak up because I can't see hands raised immediately.

Chairman McLaughlin, I do have some questions, if I may.

Yes, please do. Go right ahead.

The committee would like to ask questions first. They can wait.

Nope, go right ahead.

Yeah, so Chief Deputy Donovan, thank you for looking into this and for reaching out to this new management about the request to have cameras. And also, you haven't mentioned this, but It was communicated to me that also there's a conversation about potentially having someone stay after they close to just during, like right now, June, move out, see it move out in a month. Also in September. So if there are any donations that are being dropped off after they close, there's someone there. So I don't know if that's something that was officially discussed. And... and if it's something the Salvation Army is going to look into, which definitely will help. As you mentioned, there's theft, but there's also just people dropping off donations outside of the hours when the business is open. So I just wanted to check with you if this is something that, the Salvation Army is entertaining at all?

To the chair, to the council, yes. Thank you for bringing that up. It's one thing I forgot in my notes. Mr. Weems did say they have an employee that's staying after the work hours. Obviously, they can't stay there all night on the overnight, but they are staying there for a few hours after closing. He also said that every morning they have a truck there to pick up what's been either dumped or donated. They don't take mattresses. And the gentleman that I caught there last week was dropping off a mattress. It was clear he had done either a clean out or they're moving out of their apartment. And they may have been good intentions there. They said they were donating things. But a lot of times, you know, it's a little good intention, but a lot of getting rid of some stuff. But they are, you know, the Salvation Army did say they were going to have employees working later in the evenings after closing time to address it. And they also have a truck there every morning. cleaning it up after the overnight, after you all made donations or dumping. But I don't believe they're open on Sunday, so there may be a little gap there. I think you said there's a little gap there on Sundays into Mondays. But yes, you are correct.

Thank you. Thank you for adding that through the chair. I think that if they do that, that would definitely help because if there are no donations to be taken, People will not be... These folks who are coming, you know, to take stuff and resell it will have, you know, nothing that's attracting them to this location. Um... So, yeah, we'll see if they actually do that. So thank you for following up with, yeah, if you could follow up with them, that would be great. And, yeah, having cameras, I think that's kind of the minimum. I don't know, I don't think here we have anyone from ISD, but is this something that, I know this was a recommendation that was done, that was communicated to Salvation Army a year ago, so it still hasn't happened. And if we can keep pushing for this, again, this is becoming a public health issue. And I'm just looking at my notes here. So it's good to know that folks can call 911 because this is the same abutters. And... Yeah, so ISD, again, we don't have someone from ISD, so I don't know if anyone can speak to this. Oh, I see the liaison hands up. I understand that this location, I just want to say before, yeah, before Amanda, you can share with us what ISD have, what ISD looked into this and what they can and can't do. We understand that this is, you know, right in the border, Somerville, Medford. But according to my constituents and what they shared, a lot of these, you know, a lot of these behaviors are also happening on Broadway. Like this is in Somerville. Yes, the donations and all that are in the back of the buildings. But, you know, when they drag them all the way to the street and then having fights and all that, I guess this is not ISD, but that these donations are being dragged they're on the sidewalk like i've seen sidewalk things on the sidewalk many times i'm not very far from this from this location so if we can speak to that um someone can speak uh director or liaison uh nadja williams do you have a comment and what's your what title again

Uh, 3, Mr. chair director, Amanda Williams of intergovernmental affairs. I am obviously not from our team, but appreciate them for their efforts to provide some of this update. Forgive me. I'm doing a double team right now in 2 committees as you remembered. So I just wanted to step out to provide this update. So our ISD team has in fact been in touch with the City of Medford's ISD team. I think one of the biggest things that they noted is that they anticipate some of this kind of increased activity and behavior around the moving season. So that June 1st and September 1st is where they're anticipating to see this. They have, the City of Medford has gone out and they did issue a violation ON EARLIER IN JUNE, AND THEY'RE CONTINUING TO MONITOR THAT. SIMILARLY TO HOW WE ARE ADDRESSING THIS MATTER IN SOMERVILLE, THEY RECOGNIZE THAT THIS INVOLVES COLLABORATION WITH THE HELP DEPARTMENT, THE SALVATION ARMY MANAGEMENT, AND THE POLICE. SO AT LEAST FROM OUR CROSS MUNICIPAL LINES, I'M GLAD TO SEE THAT THERE IS A SHARED EFFORT TO ADDRESS THIS, AS COUNCILOR SAIT MENTIONED. The area is predominantly jurisdictionally in Medford. So Somerville ISD does not have the ability to enforce and or ticket in those areas. But we have been doing our due diligence to at least continue to encourage the city of Medford and figure out what else we can do to help partner to get this resolved. And I think I might have heard the deputy chief speaking to the fact that the Salvation Army noted that they did hire an individual to stay after hours until about 730 PM when they close at 5 PM. But that a lot of the dropping off of the donations are happening after hours. And of course, on a Sunday or a weekend can make it a little bit more challenging. But that is the update at least that I can share from ISD and from the administration that we recognize this is an issue and we are trying to address it in a couple different angles.

Thank you. Any more questions, Councilor Said?

Through the chair, thank you, Director. I appreciate you reaching out to ISD, and I'm glad to hear that Medford ISD are also on this. So hopefully this, you know, since the area where the donations are being dropped off are technically in Medford. So I think right now I'm mostly satisfied with what I'm hearing. But, you know, there's having a plan and there's making sure that there's a follow-up and these things actually happen, making sure the employee is there. The fact that they're not there on Sunday and Monday, you know, that's an opportunity for, you know, this kind of behavior. But... we'll wait and see what happens there. And, and in, in June and also after, in September, especially the first few weeks in September, I think having ISD do directed patrol is going to be helpful, making sure there's, you know, they're there regularly so that, you know, this, you know, we're not, You know, because once folks know this is a gathering area, it's hard to stop them. So that way, things get addressed before they get out of control again. So I appreciate everyone who looked into this. And I will definitely reach out again and see for follow-ups and to see what's actually being implemented.

Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Klangen.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yeah, I mean, this is a long-standing issue. I've dealt with this in past committees, I think. First of all, it's kind of a fascinating situation with that house back there. On Google, it shows it as 483, which would make it maybe part of the liquor store. I'm assuming that house is completely Medford.

Does anybody know the answer to that? Thank you.

And, yeah, so through the years, you can look at the Google Maps. Like, they had a fence with a gate. Then the gate went away. Then the whole fence went away. And when I was dealing with this a while ago, I, you know, I think the solution, in my opinion, would be, you know, motion-sensitive cameras and lights and the cameras with, you know, two-way capability to, you know, speak to the people on the other side, whether it's dumping or anything they're doing, you know, again, not so strictly that, you know, we expect it every time, but I'm saying that just seems like, because it's a very difficult situation to address when you have people that want to do good and leave stuff, and then you have an open space. Yeah, the thing is very challenging. I think the thing that makes the most sense to me is, well, gating off, like you said, keep time and gating off a certain portion. So because the roof obviously is part of the fraction, too. I mean, I think people go up there, they drink, whatever. So there's multiple issues there as far as just being a hangout. I think, you know, proper lighting and motion-sensitive cameras, if Salvation Army is willing to do that, if somebody, you know, somewhere is willing to kind of monitor and just be like, hey, you know, this is private property. Could you please, you know, not hang out here or whatever? Other than that, it's probably going to be a lot of cat and mouse and just, you know, not want to lock people up every time they're on the property, especially as you said, it's kind of a tricky situation where there is an easement to a front door. So hopefully the Salvation Army can come up with some sort of solution that'll help alleviate the situation. But the best thing would be too, is if people just didn't dump their stuff there. I know people don't want to throw stuff in the trash and I know people But anytime we have an aid box somewhere, this is an issue. Anytime we have an area where donations are accepted. And like I said, they used to do kind of hours. They had a gate. They did hours for donations. But I know that even that can be challenging as well. So people will just leave them on the sidewalk and then we might ding them for a ticket. It's kind of just whack-a-mole. But it sounds like you guys are working great with the Salvation Army and hopefully they can put some lighting and cameras up and we can get that solution going.

Chief Donovan, did you have a comment?

Yeah, just to kind of close out from the police department's point of view. Yeah, we are meeting with them. Just, Councilor Clayton, you hit the nail on the head. There's a lot of cat and mouse. But as soon as we conclude that meeting, I'll circle back with the council through IGA and give you guys a summary of what we came out of the meeting. We can lead a horse to water, but we can't necessarily force them to put up cameras and lighting. But that's going to be a solution, you know, until they get tired of being cited by ISD and Medford. But I will definitely update the council through IGA.

Two questions. And there's no representative from ISD here, correct? Is that right, Director Nigel Williams?

Mr. Chair, that is correct. Okay.

I do view most of this as an ISD issue. If it's not direct crime, then it's a definitely citation issue and accountability for the property itself. So it sounds like this parking lot is not a public way, correct? There's a means of egress for another property, but this is not a public way, correct?

To the chair. I wouldn't necessarily call it a public way, but there is a right of way for deliveries, mail. Amazon. So there is that kind of sticky situation where we always say the public has a right to access, but it is limited, I guess you can say.

Well, the reason I'm saying this is I've had a number of issues in my day with properties that are not being kept well. And if you can visibly see it from the street, then that's a findable offense. So I've seen this myself where you can see directly from the street people rummaging through piles of what appears to be trash just laid about everywhere. And again, unless there's a direct crime of theft or someone doing something illegal, that still seems like a findable offense to me and easy to view from street view. And I love the Salvation Army and the mission they have, but after seeing it personally myself, it's just not something that should be accepted to happen. And if they're not able to maintain their own site, then maybe they shouldn't be having these drop-offs at all. So I think that it definitely falls upon them to correct this, and the city can do as much as it can, but Ultimately, this sounds like something that ISD should be investigating on a regular basis. They could do this every day to address it. Councilor Saeed?

Thank you, Chair. Thank you for adding that. We don't have someone from ISD here, so we didn't ask ISD-related questions. But the only question I will ask about that, and I agree, just fine them because, after all, they're business and they should be following the rules. Can some of the ISD issue these fines for things that are happening in the all the way in the back. And again, that part, we know it's Medford. Can some of ISD do that? My understanding is that it's no. So some of ISD is working with Medford ISD, so Medford ISD can issue those fines. Am I correct, Director?

We have Chief Donovan and Director Najim Williams, who would like to lead. Hi.

I could jump in. I mean, from from a, I would say from a legal standpoint, having been around for a while, if their occupancy permit is issued to the city of Somerville, then we have a significant amount of sway over them.

Yes. Director, did you want to comment? You were lowered your hand. I would just also add, even if it was on Medford property, it's like issue the fine and have them come in and pull out a map and prove that it's in Medford because you can see it from some of them. And again, I don't want to be punitive with them because I do like their mission and what they represent, but it does come down to basic property maintenance and we would hold every resident accountable the same exact way. So if there's no further discussion, Councilor Said, would you be comfortable marking this work complete, or would you like to keep it in committee?

I am comfortable marking this as work complete for now, and we will have a conversation with some of the ISD to figure out what they can do there. I would just say, I would just request that since some of the ISDM for ISD are in discussion, ask the director to... Basically, can we... work with Medford ISD somehow? Is this something that, like, cities do together? One of the things that was mentioned is a fence. A fence will help a lot. So if they keep, you know, if, like, you don't put a fence up, then you keep getting citations, you keep getting fined. If this is, it's to me, like, I don't know, but, you know, I, I used to work exactly works in this case, but when cameras would be great, but, you know, lighting would be great, but. a fence is a minimum. This is your property. And since, you know, there's a house there in the back, just like for your area, have a fence. So with the fence, with good signage, so that people, when they show up there with their, you know, donations, they know not to do that. One thing that was measured is the mattresses. I've seen multiple times mattresses there. We had just changed our ordinance. The Salvation Army should know that and should, put signage there saying, do not drop off your, we do not accept mattresses. So yeah, again, I will feel comfortable marking this as we're complete and reach out to ISD to start that conversation. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you. If there's no further discussion, I'll leave this on the table, mark it, we're complete. All right. And then Director and Agent Williams, did you have items that you wanted to take up out of order?

Through you, Mr. Chair, yes. I believe I'm just, Director Taylor and I are jumping from HCDE right now. It was the two items. Let me see. With Director Taylor on it. Let me see.

It is item agenda item number 7, 26, 0, 8, 3, 8, and then item number.

Start with 7, I'm Adam Clark. Can you please read item number 7.

Yes, I can. Item number seven, ID number 26-0838, that the chief information officer provide this council with a summary report on the current accessibility status of city-operated digital properties, including websites, platforms, and portals, and share any plans to ensure new properties comply with web content accessibility guidelines using principles like accessibility-first design.

Councilor Klinger, you're signed on to this. Do you want to give an explanation of what you're going for here?

I mean, there's, I believe there's guidelines issued by the federal government, and it sounds like there was an extension on it. I mean, that's really, I just wanted to make sure that we were in compliance.

Okay. I see. This is number seven. I'm sorry.

This is number seven.

Yeah.

So this would just be sort of like an internal audit to make sure that, you know, outside of the guidelines that we're, you know, wherever possible that we're making sure that we're, we're up to the standards of accessibility. You know, there are, you know, there's the mandated guidelines on websites, but then there's also using principles like accessibility first design.

So it was kind of more of just like a self-internal audit outside of the mandated guidelines. All right. I see Director Taylor here under the name of Director Nigel Williams. Would you like to update us on this?

Sure. Just for the record, my name is Denise Taylor. I'm the Director of Communications and Public Engagement. And I apologize for being late, but two committees requested my presence at the same time this evening. So I'm happy to update you on the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. WCAG is how I've heard it pronounced. Would you like me to just give a general overview of where things stand? Or would you like to ask questions?

I'll start with an overview as I don't know the subject well.

Actually, Mr. Chair, we might as well take up item number nine as well at the same time, I would think. Okay.

Can you please read item number nine as well?

Yep. Item number nine to be taken up with item number seven. So item nine, ID number 26-0824, that the Americans with Disabilities Act coordinator submit a written report to the city council regarding the timeline for ADA web content accessibility guidelines. 2.1 under title two in the plan for its completion.

All right, please proceed.

Sure. So I am not the ADA coordinator, but I did submit a memo and a report on behalf of the city. And so just as it's required that sidewalks and buildings and other features are ADA accessible, there are also federal requirements for accessibility of websites and other digital tools like apps. And the current web compliance rules that municipalities are expected to comply with are the WCAG, the WCAG 2.1 Level A and Level 2A guidelines from the Department of Justice. Those guidelines originally were expected to have a deadline for compliance of April 20th, 2026. The deadline was extended by a full year for cities of our size. So our deadline is now a little less than a year from now on April 26th, 2027. However, we spent the full year prior to that making sure we would be compliant by the deadline we expected. And so I'm happy to report that the work that we did on SomervilleMA.gov, the city's two apps, as well as other digital tools that are embedded in the website, got us into what is called the high compliance category, which is where most municipalities were targeting for compliance, which is above 90%. And I would note that the report that I submitted back in May shows a lower compliance level than we are currently at. Because the key thing for this is that compliance is not achieved by doing all of the work, putting your pens down and walking away. This is an ongoing effort that will be continuing for as long as we have digital assets. So we are currently at 92% for Level A and 92.4% for Level AA assets. And we are continuing to strive to get as close to 100% as possible, which is generally not considered from a technical perspective, something that you will ever achieve because as soon as you get one thing fixed, usually something else shows up that needs to be corrected. So it's sort of a game of whack-a-mole. But what I can share with you is that we uh worked with our vendor uh evolving web to not only bring the city's website into compliance but also on all of the city's micro sites uh to the ex with the exclusion of the schools which are working on a full overhaul of their website their website will be replaced with a new website so they're focused on that rather than making corrections to the current site But all of the city's microsites were either worked on by our vendor or by vendors that work on those sites. The libraries have their own vendor, for example. And the types of fixes that were made were to address things that can cause problems for people who have disabilities. visual needs or cognitive needs or mobility needs. So things that got fixed were things like you have to have what's called alt text, alternative text for all images and graphics. If you cannot see the image or graphic, the alt text allows a screen reader to read to you the description of what is there. We worked on color contrast, font sizes, and also plain language improvements for cognitive needs. 1.27 million occurrences were resolved in 29 different categories. And the, let's see, I'm sorry, I'm just scanning through this report here. Really good news that I want to share as well is that PDFs have long been a barrier for access for persons using screen readers in particular. And just on Thursday, we installed a new tool called Doc Access. which with the tap of a button will convert any PDF on the website to accessible HTML that can be read by a screen reader. There is also a button on that tool that allows you to translate the PDF. and a call service if you need live support. So I would encourage any of you later on your own time to click a PDF on the website and test the tool out. It may not be, it doesn't create a difference for someone who's not using a screen reader that is as noticeable, but it's a resolution of a significant barrier We will also be training staff to create compliant PDFs, but this tool is a fail-safe to account for human error because there's a lot of requirements to make a document accessible. So this helps us overcome that. I could stop there if you have any questions. Any questions from the committee?

Yeah, Mr. Chair. So you said, I'm just trying to remember, I wish I could see the old website and see what the differences are. I know maybe it's archived somewhere or something. So part of the guidelines is the poor. It's perceivable, operable, like you said, understandable, robust. I know that this can encompass, like you said, everything from color contrast. So you're saying currently our front-facing companies Some city assembly website is in compliance with WCAG.

Yeah, so the goal is described as fully compliant. Municipalities have been interpreting that to mean to get above 90% with the goal of continually striving to get as close to 100 as possible. And yes, so we are at a combined compliance of actually 93% for overall Title II compliance. And within the two categories, it's 92 and 92.4. And I know that that doesn't average to 93, but the overall compliance is calculated slightly differently. And again, that doesn't mean that you won't find compliance. things on the website that need to be addressed. We are continually working on this. Our vendor is working on this. We use tools to scrape the site and identify issues to resolve. There are still issues to resolve. And we will continue bumping that percentage up in the coming months. And once we get to next year's deadline, which we would already have qualified for, we hope to be at an even higher level of ongoing percentage compliance.

Thank you, Mr. Chia, and through you. So you said like some of our vendors helped us and we don't have necessarily anybody in-house that would specialize in sort of what what we're, you know, how do we get to where we need to be, um, in terms of compliance, like with, with the websites and stuff like that. It's not something that.

Actually we do. Um, so, um, all, um, so we have, uh, two and a half people on our, our web team and, uh, they are, they all worked on this as well. Um, as did I, um, and, uh, they are, uh, both versed in this as well as actively working on this every day. It was such a massive undertaking to get this done by what we thought was the deadline that we had to hire an outside firm that had a very large team and tools that we don't have in order to get us quickly into compliance. But maintenance... Once we get to like the highest possible level, like a holding level, our team will be the ones who are mainly doing this. We have a tool in-house that they can use to find what needs to be fixed and they know how to fix these things. It's just right for the past year and for the next few months, we're still using a lot of time from the vendor in order to get to our baseline that we're looking for.

That's great. Okay. Just three, Mr. Chairman, if I had to hear about this tool, because I was going to say, how are you troubleshooting? You know, are you asking people to test it out? People with disabilities that, you know, play around on the website and, you know, people that might have site issues or something like to see how things are going. But if there's a tool, and this is all great. I'm satisfied. You know, I think this satisfies both of these orders as far as I think one of the questions was, where are we on it? Just in general, because a lot of people thought that the deadline, you know, was fast approaching and then they extended it. So it's great that we're at this point ahead of the game to just keep tweaking and, you know, when the deadline does reach us. We will feel fully confident that we are in compliance. I guess just for a second, what I was getting at, and if the web team is trained and versed on this and have been conferring with people where there's a tool that is very effective, that's great. Just to talk for a second here, I know there's talk in the community about what it means to have a dedicated ADA person And I know right now we had a staff change. So there's a few people kind of filling that role. And it's just when these things come up, you know, it'd be this type, you know, and these things in this, of this nature of this sensitivity with aggressive ADA, it'd be great to sort of have a dedicated person to kind of help address and, you know, present on. So people understand what, exactly might have been changed. But great work by all of you and your team for compliance. That's great. I just want to make a plug for again, making sure that we're in the spirit of John and my order, making sure I remember seven, making sure that we're constantly sort of reminding ourselves to with whether it's a new app or whatever, to make sure that we are putting principles like accessibility first design as part of our forward thinking plan. But thank you to your team and their work. Really appreciate it. That's all I have, Mr. Chair.

All right, thank you. See no further discussion. Both of these items will be laid on the table for approval. Work complete.

Thank you very much.

Thank you. Any other items? Thank you. Any other items to take out of order, Director Najam-Williams?

Do you, Mr. Chair? I believe the next item was.

Sorry to interrupt. Sorry, real quick. On those two items, it was mentioned that there was a report and a summary both sent over. I don't see them attached as attachments to the agenda. I was just going to ask the clerk, was that something that came over to you that was supposed to be shared?

Yeah, I also did not see those, so I did not share those. So I'm not sure if they haven't been attached or where those may be.

Okay. But they will eventually get attached to this record for when we, at some point, we'll get those from. Okay. So you might need to circle back. Somebody need to circle back with the Director of Communications.

We'll figure that out. Director, what's the next item?

Through you, Mr. Chair, the next item was agenda item number 11-260647. Okay.

Please read that item, Madam Clerk.

Apologies. I was texting the clerk's team. Which item number was that? 11- Great. Item number 11, ID number 26-0647, that the administration update this council on the ordering and maintenance of firefighter equipment, such as fire engines, ladder trucks, and all fire apparatus.

This one's mine. Let's see. Where to begin? I think everyone was in the room when the fire department brought these issues to attention, so everyone in the committee understands it. So I'm going to hand it over to the director and see who's on the city's side to discuss this.

I'm going to hand it over to the director. Okay.

While we're waiting, I see Director Rawson there. I bet he's got some opinions. Director Rawson, do you want to weigh in on this?

Good evening, Chair. Assistant Chief Charney will lead this. I'm always here to support, and I've got other items on the agenda. Thanks.

Okay. So who are we waiting for?

I'm on. I'm here.

There we go. Chief Charney?

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

Sean Tierney, Assistant Fire Chief. I have some data if you want to go over on our apparatus. Currently, we have all of our apparatus in service. We have two spears in service and a spear ladder, two spear engines and a spear ladder truck and a spear rescue all available for service. We just recently were delivered engine five on June 23rd, went into service. We have a shop truck being delivered at the end of the month. We expect a new heavy rescue to be delivered in December 26th, so January of 27th. We're also expecting a new engine one to be delivered in January of 27th, and then a new ladder two to be delivered in June of 27. We also have ordered a new command vehicle for the chief that was replacing an old vehicle and that's on order, but I have no date for delivery. Okay.

Anything else to add to this before we have?

Do you have any other questions for the chair?

Yeah, so I guess my question would be, are there any issues with these engines due to the speed bumps and other traffic carbon measures that were mentioned? I assume, Chief, you're familiar with the complaints coming from the Firefighters Union about... Slow down and speed and the potential impact of traffic, common measures on the vehicles themselves. Would do you see any impact from these from these traffic, common measures on the vehicles themselves?

I mean, I, we don't have data to reflect that it's specifically caused by that. I mean, it could be any number of things that conditions of the roads. The age of the apparatus. It's a possibility that it does contribute. I mean, I'm not trying to say that it doesn't, but we can't say for certain that one particular cause is what causes maintenance to these vehicles. We did have a busy June. May and June, we've had like over $100,000 in maintenance. So we were, you know, some of it was transmission work. Some of it was suspension work. so we did have multiple vehicles out of service some of its backup in a lot of people are experiencing the same thing so a lot of the vendors that provide service as far as are backed up sometimes the truck stays out of service for some time so we did have some considerable difficulties keeping apparatus going over the those months of may and june however um Year in, year out, we stay pretty steady. Last year was a pretty anomaly for heavy maintenance on some of the vehicles. But like I said, we had to replace the transmission on the tower. The year prior, we had to replace part of the aerial for the tower. So not everything can be so easily determined that it is the speed bumps or the traffic calming. It is... It's probably a combination of a lot of things. We've always had maintenance before speed bumps, so it's hard to say what exactly would be the cause. But the roads are in some places in tough condition. I can't say that that doesn't contribute either.

Curious, have you noticed any increase in maintenance issues in the past three years compared to the years before that?

So just looking over the last three years, the last year has definitely been our largest expenditures of maintenance, but we've had some significant repairs to some of the apparatus. As I said, we had a major transmission repair and we had a major aerial repair. So we don't track numbers for exactly suspension related things. These vehicles do get We've had a lot of brake replacement in the last year or two. These vehicles, as they start to get older, you start to need to replace brakes. It's not as much at the beginning, but as they get older, we have brakes, suspension. Things do go. I mean, I've heard multiple opinions of what could be the cause, but as I said, we don't have any hard data to say one thing is the root cause of any of this damage.

Okay. Has there been any issues in terms of firefighters' ability to perform their duties due to any equipment issues?

I mean, I don't believe that we've always provided safe apparatus. We take it out of service if something is wrong. We've found replacements in many cases for apparatus. We borrow apparatus from different cities and towns. We've been lucky enough for relationships that the chief has had with other fire chiefs that we've been able to, if we have an extended lapse and our spears are out of service, that we can get safe apparatus from a neighboring town. And we also help them out and contribute the same way. Fortunately right now, anything can change in any day, but like I said, currently we have two spare engines in service that are ready to be backups a spare ladder truck. And we anticipate once we get a new engine one in January, that we'll have a third engine. So our plan is to fully rehabilitate those two spares because the price of buying a spare apparatus is astronomical. So it's more cost effective for us to be able to rehabilitate those spares. But having newer apparatus will enable us to be able to put a piece up to get rehabs over a, it'll take a period of time and having the newer apparatus, hopefully less maintenance will be on them. We'll be able to get these spears into top-notch shape.

I'm not an expert on any of this at all, and I definitely thank you as the expert on this issue. You've been in the department for a long time. Are you seeing anything abnormal about equipment issues in the past few years? Anything that should be of concern? Anything that we should really be addressing?

I think that the delay of From when you order an apparatus until you receive it is different now from earlier in my career. For instance, we ordered Engine 5 in October of 23, and we just put it in service in June of 26. And they keep getting delays on the manufacturing end. So that's something that we're looking at to try to work on with the city. And we're coming up with a new capital improvement plan to maybe readdress the timing of how we replace so that it addresses some of these delays that are occurring.

So that sounds more like a procurement issue than a vehicle issue itself then, correct? Correct. Okay. Okay. One more question, I'll turn it over to Council Clingan. So I believe the head of the Firefighters Union made a claim that he believes that fire engines have slowed down three seconds, I believe, three to five seconds per speed bump. Do you agree with that claim? And has it impacted firefighters' ability to perform their duties at all in the city?

I don't know the exact statistic that he was referring to, but I think that a speed bump obviously slows you down. That's what it's designed to do. However, that's only part of the response is the actual on the road part. We've looked at ways to address our total response times. from introducing the Purvis system to shave some time off of the turnout time. It's a brief, quick turnout. You get information while you're on the apparatus, while you're already on the road, instead of sitting in a station waiting to hear a whole line of what the situation is. We look at data all the time. Our analyst is constantly providing us with data. So we might change something in East Somerville that we used to be from headquarters was faster. We're finding due to conditions now that maybe from Union Square, we hit it quicker. Maybe from assembly, that's changed too. We look at how we respond with the new stations. So we're constantly reassessing if something, I'm not saying that a speed bump doesn't slow you down. It's obviously, that's what it's meant to do. But our response times aren't showing a significant impact due to them. That's okay.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair, through you. So just with regards to the ordering, you know, we've I know myself and Councilor McLaughlin have talked to some firefighters and, you know, we discussed the topic of, this isn't a point of any finger outside of, inside of the city, the topic of private equity buying up all of the fire. I think they're down to three, three major, three companies, three major companies that provide. So... provide that, that manufacture fire engines. So I've, I've seen articles where it's like, you know, it's, it's everywhere. It's happening. It's taking, you know, four years, three, four years, five years to get a fire engine. Um, I don't know how, like what the procurement situation is and how to, you know, if there's a way to use a more, you know, change to a more local place that may be able to, um, You know better serve us in a quicker manner, but I know there's also supply chain issues like that so just that i'm just addressing the issue that you said about about the changing time time time that it takes to. To get a vehicle, but it sounds like we have one already online, and I think you said three in the pipeline three new trucks so so currently like I said we won just delivered on the 23rd of June, we have.

One a rescue truck being delivered and December. An engine company delivered in January and a ladder truck in next June. Okay. All have been ordered. You know, it'll be three years come delivery, two and a half anyway. There's been difficulty. It's definitely a supply difficulty. Can't even, it's due to several factors. One, like you named with the companies, but we, you know, they changed some of the emissions things with some of these motors. So some of the vendors can't even quote you on what the apparatus will look like in three years because they don't even know what type of engine they'll be able to put in it at that point. So we also face the difficulty of just even getting quoted a price from a truck that you're not going to receive for three years. They don't know how to do that for us. So there's multiple layers to the difficulty.

Okay. Okay. um but like i said it sounds like we have some new apparatus coming in so that's really great i think i would just like to touch upon also the equipment factor um do we have so we we have must have like a head mechanic or is it just or is there just a mechanic per station or what is the master mechanic yes that's and so they kind of act as de facto like fleet manager or what whatnot

somewhat. He wears a lot of hats. He does our whole staff. The fleet manager, as far as procuring, is through the DBW. Not for the fire apparatus, but any vehicle like any of the fire prevention cars.

I guess I was just thinking it might be useful for data tracking. I know what you're saying. Fleet manager, purchasing through DBW, any major equipment. I get that. I'm not asking the mass mechanics to start keeping track, but I hear what you're saying. Everything is a factor. Is it the age of the thing? Is it a bad winter or a lot of salt on the road? All these things contribute, so it's hard to really put your finger on whether or not increase in repairs has been a thing due to speed humps alone. I get that. I just think maybe... And you just from sense are saying that it doesn't seem like there's a correlation per se, but I'm curious.

I'm not saying that either. I'm not saying that it doesn't play a factor. I just don't. I don't think that you can just say this is what's causing all of our issues because I don't. All right. No more.

Everyone plays through the chair. Yeah. No more than you can say that the. the condition of like Highland Avenue, the roads in general, it's all playing a factor is what I was saying. So yeah. So I guess as far as equipment goes, we have, you know, we're in good shape with regards to the trucks. What about any other fire apparatus? Like, I guess it's kind of to counsel McLaughlin's question of like, is there any needs that you see that we're sort of behind on outside of like fired trucks? But like, are we, you know, in terms of, um, safety equipment and stuff like that, are we pretty well stocked up and up to date on all of our, you know, whether, but you know, you hear these things in the news about somebody voted against these suits that are better for health. Um, Do you have any comment on that just around, because we're talking about equipment.

Through the chair. Are you talking about like firefighting gear? Yeah. We keep an eye on what's coming available. I don't think that, you know, there's been a lot of talk of PFAS equipment. free gear. And, um, there is one manufacturer that's out now that it's, it's kind of a new thing. I don't know what the durability of it will, will look like. I don't know how it's going to hold up. I, we don't, there's not enough information out there for this new, new thing to make a decision. Um, right now where we do have discussions with the union, obviously on all this stuff, we're, we're on the same page with them on this. So, Everybody has two sets of gear currently, so nobody's lacking for any gear or equipment. You know, we put out notices throughout the year for captains of every apparatus for any equipment that they need, and, you know, they come to us, and as we have the funds, we find ways to get them what they need.

Great. That's all I really was looking for, and, yeah, it sounds like you said everybody's kind of fully geared up and stocked up and um so we're good on that front as well um yeah so uh like i said with these new trucks coming online that's really great news i guess as far as the maintenance of the trucks and whether or not what's causing if there is an increase or not an increase uh in repairs i guess maybe what i'm suggesting is we you know may try to like track some data and just to see if it's specific things like obviously like you said breaks you know and then there's the other piece that they may not make them like they did you know five years ago so but um but like breaks and stuff like that that's kind of normal wear and tear stuff especially in a city like ours um but we just want to make sure you guys everyone has everything they need and we'll keep an eye on you know um whether or not we're, and it sounds like with these new trucks that we're moving in the right direction, I guess. Now, the only other thing we'll be bringing up probably another time is the buildings, you know, themselves. So that's all in this situation.

Thank you. So I wish there was someone from the firefighters union here to have a full discussion. And that's on me for not inviting them. So I am going to lay this on the table when market were complete. And just if an issue might come up where the firefighters union feels like there's questions that haven't been answered, I may send it back to committee. but for right now I feel satisfied with the responses. So thank you very much Chief for coming. This item will be laid on the table when marked work complete. Thank you. Director Nigel Williams, anything else that you want to take out of order?

Mr. Chair, I believe the next item would be agenda item number 21,

please read that one all right item number 21 id number 25-1770 that was counts that the city council discussed the safety of the summer street bike lane design around or near platinum street to benton road and how and if additional safety modifications can be made okay who's here to discuss this item

Chair, this is Brad Rawson. I serve as Director of Mobility and OSPCD. Happy to speak quickly on this item. Please do. So, Chair, I appreciate this order. City staff from multiple departments are constantly evaluating street reconstruction, design, safety, monitoring and evaluating safety conditions, travel speeds, user experience, and we welcome feedback from residents, from counselors, and from partner organizations all the time. So in terms of Summer Street, just a quick recap for the committee. The design process that went into the Summer Street redesign was between 2019 and 2021. Construction process was between 2022 and 2025 as part of the big Spring Hill sewer separation work. So we're about a year or a little bit more than that in terms of monitoring. We did receive a report from one constituent who experienced a bad bike crash on that facility. I've spoken with that resident, and we appreciate that person telling their story and asking us to make sure that we've really reviewed these types of facilities to make sure that they're safe for users of all ages and all abilities. The crash in question occurred between School Street and Spring Street, headed uphill on Summer Street. Chair, as you and the committee may remember, that section of Summer Street is exceptionally narrow, much narrower than most two-way streets in Somerville, and with insufficient width from curb to curb to provide for all of the different things that we all try to provide. And so for many years before the project, the condition of Summer Street was two narrow travel lanes, one in each direction, one side of curbside parking and one narrow bike facility. That condition was retained in the new design. Because of the narrowness chair, the bike facility was raised up, but only three inches off the street level. And it used a sloped curb between street level and bike facility level. And then there was another three inch gap between the bike facility level and the sidewalk level. Those are standard design details that are used in constrained locations like Summer Street. And the design feedback at the time from partners, including Somerville Fire, was that it was important to have some mountable with in terms of apparatus getting up there if needed to serve adjacent properties. The only alternative that city staff examined there to provide a more traditional 90 degree six inch granite curb for the bike facility separation would have involved removing all curbside parking on the other side of the street. And from our community engagement process and our standards, we thought that that was not the best fit and not the best balance. So Chair, to summarize, that design is definitely just very constrained. And we acknowledge that that sloped curb can be tricky for some users. Users who try to exit that curb from a climbing bike lane standpoint to turn left on Laurel, on Green, et cetera, will need to do so with caution. And they would probably need to do so at a steeper angle and really be careful about it. And that might not work for everybody. And so the guidance that we provide to residents and users is that sometimes you might need to get past your destination and then use a crosswalk across the street at the next intersection. Again, we are sympathetic to anybody who's experienced a crash and the resident who I've spoken with has acknowledged our condolences and our empathy. Staff will continue to accept feedback. And I'm happy to answer committee's questions, but I also do just want to quickly want to leave you with some of the things that have been positive in terms of our experience these first year and a half. Traffic volumes and traffic speeds are down substantially on Summer Street. Chair, we're talking 40% decrease in through traffic, which is really important for safety and for quality of life. And at the same time, we have not observed any displacement of that traffic to parallel streets like Somerville Avenue or Highland Avenue. Speeding behavior is down from 55% speeding behavior to 20% speeding behavior. These are really substantial safety benefits from the Summer Street redesign. In terms of what's next, we'll continue to monitor any reports of near misses or crashes The crash in question is the only one that I have found in our databases. But again, we keep an eye on these things with some of the police department. And we're always accepting constituent and council feedback and questions. So I hope that's a helpful kind of three-minute summary of how we've gotten here, how we evaluate success for areas to improve with street designs like this one.

Thank you. So I'll talk about this one as it directly affects me on a nearly daily basis. As I take my son to school going up Summer Street, I use this bike lane. I definitely see what the counselor who submitted this order, the concerns are, especially around Benton Road. And to me, it's actually all the intersections along Summer Street as a cyclist is very dangerous to turn onto that street. And so say I'm riding even Central Street, which has two bike lanes to turn from Central onto Summer is a really sharp turn. You have to go a little bit out on the road. If there's oncoming traffic, then it can be scary and definitely can see how an accident would happen that way. And then on Benton Road, it's good to hear that there hasn't been too much traffic deferment onto other streets. But Benton Road definitely has a lot more traffic due to the Central Street bike lane sign. I know this personally because if I don't ride my bike, if I don't ride my son to school, I'm driving him there. and i can no longer go down central street so i go down benton road and there's two-way traffic going that way uh which creates some uh back up there but more importantly could potentially lead to a bike accident or a pedestrian accident if somebody was using that road not offering any solutions right now but since we're in committee i just want to share that because i see it personally and just a shorter in terms of some of these corners i don't know if there's anything that can be done around flex posts or something like that uh or even like when i take those turns i ride onto the sidewalk just because it's safer and i don't know if there's something we can do to indicate to people that it's safe to ride on the sidewalk if you're taking these sharp turns uh kind of like different paint uh to indicate that it's acceptable Just ideas, director, for you to bring back, but I will definitely say that I have personally witnessed and experienced some of these concerns. Any further discussion? Seeing none, this item will be laid on the table. Mark, we're complete.

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, committee.

Thank you. Next item, director.

You're calling the shots today.

Agenda item number 20, I think it's item 26-0057.

Sure. Item number 20, ID number 26-0057, that the Director of Human Resources and the Chief of Police work with state officials to provide crossing guards on McGrath Highway.

Thank you. Who do we have for this item?

Mr. Chair, we have Director of Human Resources, Ann Gill. We also are joined by our Crossing Guard Supervisor, Cicero, and Lieutenant Holland. But I believe we're starting with our Crossing Guard Supervisor, Cicero.

Okay, we'll start with you, Officer Cicero. To start out, I am the crossing guard supervisor, but I am not an officer.

Okay.

All right. I'll just call you Mr. Cicero. All right. Let's go. This is my first time addressing the committee, so bear with me. But it has been told to me that we needed a crossing guard at McGrath and Broadway. And so what I did was I dug into the history of it. And McGrath Highway is a state highway, so currently it is supported by state employees. So if you notice, there are two crossing guards on McGrath and Pearl Street, and they are state crossing guards. They are not crossing guards from the city. Another item is there is an overpass on Otis Street to cross McGrath Highway. So in the past, when there were requests for the state to put a crossing guard at McGrath and Broadway, they denied it because they said everyone should be using the overpass and they already have two crossing guards at McGrath and Pearl Street. To add to this, whenever someone puts in for a new crossing guard at any crosswalk, I do my own assessment. The crossing guards I have. The main reason for the crossing guards is support the schools of Somerville and to cross safely the children that are 13 and under. So that's the main thing that my crossing guards do. And so when I did my assessment, I did it on Tuesday, April 14th. I did it from 7.15 to 8.30, which is the morning shift of all crossing guards. And what I found out is when I watched the people cross, I had 55 people cross. 50 were adults, five were teenagers and they were traveling westbound. So they were, uh, traveling the opposite way to any, um, schools in East Somerville. So in my opinion, it doesn't fit the criteria of Somerville crossing guards. Um, there were no children crossing there. And, um, If anyone would like to do an assessment with me and don't agree with my assessment, I'd be more than happy to go down there and do an assessment when school starts again. I currently have 42 crossing guards for the regular season, and now I'm starting up with 26 for the summer. So any questions?

First of all, I definitely appreciate you taking this so seriously and I'll tell you where this comes from for me is I do have constituents occasionally ask me why there's no crossing guard at the Broadway and McGrath site just because it is such a treacherous area to ride. And I've spoken to my state rep about it. And I think the way I phrase this order is a few this I think this item even maybe a year or two old, because the idea was we know that it's a state road and would therefore require state crossing guards. uh and the previous administration there was some discussion about this but it really didn't go anywhere uh so that's why i was bringing up now to see if the city could work with the state to see if there's a possibility of getting state crossing guards at this site uh council claim yeah this chair through you i just think like now would be the perfect time since um you know

they might as well get somebody down there and accustomed to crossing there before they can't they're not going to be able to use the overpass excuse for much longer if you know their intention is to take it down you know whether or not that happens and you know whatever whatever it's just to point to that while also planning on taking it down it seems like um you know it might be high time to to get somebody at the broadway mcgrath and you know i just want to speak to the danger of broadway and mcgrath you know a few years ago when there was a problem with the lights i just remember um people are so crazy out there that like even we had spd out there because there was people were just creating gridlock like there like there was i forget exactly what else was going on as to why this happened but i just remember like um people would even ignore the police, you know? So it's like, it's the idea of like, you know, a crossing guy will certainly help children, but I mean, it's just like the way people cut through our city, it's really unbelievable, the lack of respect that they have for the fact that they're driving through neighborhoods. And first of all, this is great. I finally, you know, we've never met you before, and I don't know if you're new in the role or if you've been in the role, but usually we would just meet the officer in charge. I think it's now Holland. It was Thieves before. So that's great to meet you as a supervisor. And you're right to say that, yes, we are aware that there are – that's a state road and that – And I think what confuses us sometimes is that there are those two crossing guards at McGrath and Pearl. And, you know, Council McLaughlin's for years has been trying to get one. I think, you know, whether it's or at least examine having one at Highland and McGrath, which I met for Street McGrath, rather, which I know that you said that's to service the high school, which may not fall into our particular guidelines, but dangerous nonetheless. And so. If we can get the state to finally put a crossing guard where we now have two elementary schools in the East Seminole, three, I'm sorry, Capuano and then now the Edgeley with the East Seminole. We really should try to work with them to get this done once and for all. Thanks.

Chief Donovan, you had a comment?

Yeah, Mr. Chair, we have made that request to the state in the past, and they have leaned back on, as always, the two crossing guys at Pearl Street, as well as the overpass. So, you know, we can lean on our state reps more, I guess. But as far as requests from the SPD, we have made that official request.

Thank you. And I'll add, too, I have in the past requested state trooper details down there and have at times been told that the intersection is too dangerous to even have state troopers work. So crossing guard would probably be even more dangerous. I think it's a terrible intersection, and we're going to address it a little bit with the grounding of McGrath, but we're also going to lose the overpass. I am concerned about this, the long-term, what's going to happen with this terrible highway intersection. I feel satisfied with the answers tonight. And I think I'm going to circle back with my state rep, Mike Connolly, talk to him about this and see what can be done. But as of right now, I appreciate taking this so seriously and really investigating and seeing the impact of the community council. Yeah.

Yeah, I just want to add a quick plug through, Mr. Chair, to SPD as far as whether, you know, I know it's, again, it's state police, it's state road. I know that we do have some patrolling powers, but not putting it on you, whether it's you talk to them or we do it ourself, ramping up enforcement at certain times. I know that's a tricky subject, but the reason I say that is because while, you know, traffic calming and squeezing down the lanes is definitely slowing traffic in terms of driving, But it's creating more of a desperation at the lights where people are basically just running the red light a lot more often now that McGrath and Broadway is down to two lanes and it's taken them longer to get where they need to go. We need some enforcement down there. And I know SPD is spread thin, so if we can convince the troopers to go down there some morning anyway, at least to try to curb some behavior, that would really go a long way.

Thank you. So suddenly laid on the table. What mark were complete to do a time check that it's eight o'clock now I do not. I'm going to have a hard stop at nine o'clock. We got a lot of items on the agenda. So I'm going to try to get through as many items that city staff are here for. But we may leave some items on the table. We'll see what happens. Director and Agent Williams, did you want to discuss another item out of order?

Through you, Mr. Chair, I'm pulling back up that list. I believe the next item is agenda item number three, 26-1018. Excellent.

Yes, please read that item.

Item number three, ID number 26-1018, that the chief of police report to this council on the response to the recent upsurge in drug use and other drug-related activity in public spaces in and around Davis Square, including the Hodgkins Curtain Park.

Who's here to speak on this item?

Mr. Chair, Deputy Chief Dunham speaking on behalf of the police department on this item. Recognizing the time and the fact that the USA soccer team is about to start, I'll be brief.

That is not a factor in this committee, Chief. We are a basketball committee.

The mayor is a soccer person, so he is my employer. So as far as Davis Square goes, I think we all know we've provided a lot of resources to Davis Square in the last month. We ran our own plan along with other partners in the city, HHS, DPW, ISD, you name it. And we've dedicated a ton of resources to Davis Square starting May 1st. Right now, to date, I think we've made some serious, as far as the police goes, we've made some serious inroads. into Davis Square in the open drug use and general drug use within the community. We've dedicated cars, five, six, and seven, the cars dedicated to the west side of the Somerville are all committed to doing PWTs and positive contacts in Davis Square and around Davis Square, Seven Hills Park, Statue Park, and I will get to Hodgkins Park as well because I know that's a specific concern to the chair. Right now, to date, every week, every Monday morning, I get a report from my crime analyst regarding a police activity in Davis Square. But last week, for example, we had 29 positive contacts every day last week. That's director patrols, park walk and talks, business contacts, and citizen contacts. That's 29 a day. It's pretty impressive. Our officers are working very hard in the west side of the city. We've made a significant amount of arrests regarding drug use, warrants, arrests, just general nuisance arrests. We're holding everyone to the same standard in Davis Square, the murdering public, homeless, those suffering with mental illness and drug addiction. We're treating everyone the same. And we're holding everyone to a certain level of decorum in Davis Square. You know, we did it last year. We've actually ramped up even more this year with the encouragement of the mayor. And I think we have gotten a lot of positive feedback from the community as a result of our presence in Davis Square, specifically as for Hodgkins Park. Knowing that was a specific concern to you, I had reached out to our officers working in that area. Oh, in addition, we've also put plainclothes assignments down there as well. We have our community action team and officers on overtime in plainclothes working with detectives to address the issues that are difficult to address when you're in uniform. As far as Hoskins Park goes, I did reach out to the officers working in that area and added that, although it is included in the general Davis Square area, I think, you know, sometimes you get too focused on the square itself. And I've asked those officers to start spreading out a little bit into the neighboring communities, you know, be it Hoskins Park, Kenny Park. and more down towards the Cambridge line into that neighborhood as well beyond Seven Hills Park and out the bike path east towards Willow Ave. So we are expanding our resources there as well. As far as as far as Hodgkins Park, I will say that although I would like to see more in the month of June, we did do four. 14, sorry, 12 directed patrols or positive contacts in the park alone. Again, I would like to see at least one a day, and I'm going to be encouraged not moving forward. And I will know we have found some hypodermic needles in the park. We've been alerted to them. But as always, I encourage constituents, I say it myself when I talk to them, and I'd ask the city council to speak to their constituents when they, you know, speak with you. Please call us. A lot of times people will say, well, I don't see the police in the park. And, you know, please call us, you know. We base, we dedicate our resources based on your crime data and constituent feedback. So if they're seeing something in instead in Toshins Park, you know, where I played little league, minors, little league, you know, I encourage people to call us because that's how we dedicate our resources. So I'm happy to take any questions from the committee or any members attending.

Any questions from the committee? Okay. I have no questions. I'll just comment that I've been in Davis Square quite a bit lately and have definitely noticed improvement. So thank you very much for the update. If there's no discussion, I'll just lay this item on the table and mark it work complete.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, to the committee. Happy Fourth of July. Happy Fourth. Thank you.

Next item, Director.

Number three, Mr. Chair, agenda item number five. 260944.

I want to wait on that one. Let's get to other items.

Okay. Agenda item number 15.

Let's see. Sure. Let's take that one up.

All right. Agenda item 15, ID number 26-0125, that the City Council calls for an end to period poverty and an end to barriers making it difficult for residents to be able to afford menstrual products in summer.

I'm sorry, Director, I should ask that last item that we didn't discuss. Are people waiting on that? Because I just want to get other items out of the way.

uh three mr chair yes i believe we have lieutenant holland here to speak to agenda item number five which was a pd item all right let's check that item up sorry all right agenda item number five id number 26-0944 that the chief of police provide documentation in writing regarding the circumstances surrounding cyclist traffic enforcement in union square on the morning of may 28th

All right, Lieutenant Holland, are you here to discuss this? Yes, I am. All right, thank you. You have the floor.

All right, thank you. So on May 28th, we were given a request, well, a couple days before, given a request for red light enforcement in Union Square, specifically at Washington and Webster Avenue in the morning during rush hour traffic. So we sent Officer Collette out there specifically to monitor that area. He conducted five stops, one motor vehicle, which was issued a monetary fine, and then four bicycle stops for violating the red lights there. And they were issued all written warnings. That request came from... the chief from the mayor, to me from the chief, and then to him from the mayor's office.

All right. So, Officer, Lieutenant, was this anything to do with any grants from the state around traffic enforcement?

Oh, sorry. No, it was not. It was Officer Collette's regular shift. He's assigned to the traffic department. He works Monday through Friday days, 7 to 3, and that was during his regular shift, and that is all he does is traffic enforcement.

Thank you. Any questions from the committee? Seeing none, this item is laid on the table with mock work complete. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Now back to the other item.

All right, we've already read this into the record. So just confirm item 15 ID 26-0125.

Yes, thank you. Period poverty. I see Director Carroll was unmuted. I assume you're here to speak on this item.

Yes, through the chair I am. Thank you for the opportunity to speak on this item as well as some related information on what the city is doing in various city buildings. Approximately 1 in 4 persons who menstruate struggle to afford period products. 1 in 3 students miss class time regularly. due to having their period. Products can cost up to $13 a month, and some of these products are taxed as well. SNAP does not cover them, nor do many food pantries. So this is a significant issue that can affect families, people missing work, people missing school. It's been something that Councillor Strezzo has discussed with me since I've started. We launched a pilot two years ago of five locations, six locations for free period product dispensers through a company called Citron, and they both service the machines and fill them, keep them restocked, and provide some very baseline data for a monthly contract fee through HHS. The product, the pilot has been well utilized and has continued. Funding through the council has been renewed so that we can continue this initiative in the city. So there are two other related items on the agenda that ask for details around locations and things. I don't know if you'd like me to continue with those or if there are questions on the issue of period poverty.

Director and Agent Williams.

Through the chair, if you find appropriate, perhaps we could take up this item. So it's agenda item number 15, along with agenda items 18 and 19, as they are also on the same topic of menstrual products.

It's very appropriate. Please read those items.

All right, so this is item 15 being taken up with items 18 and 19. 18, ID number 26-0099, that the Director of Health and Human Services immediately install menstrual product dispensers on each floor of City Hall that provide free menstrual products. And item number 19, that the Director, oh, ID number 26-0098, that the Director of Health and Human Services immediately install menstrual product dispensers that provide free menstrual products in all city-owned bathrooms.

All right, Director Carroll, you have it again.

Great. Through the chair, thank you for that. On the item around city halls, we have installed about four or five months ago, there were dispensers installed into the public bathrooms in all three levels of city hall. All three bathrooms, I'm sorry, within City Hall. So I'm happy to report that those are installed, they're going well, being well utilized. And again, they are part of the Citron contract. We were able to add them to our contract. So to move on to the number 0098, where are they located within the city to ensure that all city-owned bathrooms have them? At this point, I can say that the Somerville Public Schools has multiple locations with either dispensers or nurse-provided products. Those are purchased through the school and the DPW maintain custodial team maintains the dispensers that are being utilized with the exception of one that was at the edgerly the old edgerly, which was the old teen space. And so that one remained there in in the school in the Winter Hill gym. The pilot through through HHS has sites at SOYA, the public bathrooms at SOYA, the Annex, Project Soup, teen spaces at Powder House. Again, the three at City Hall and the Winter Hill Gym. DPW, I do not believe has dispensers at this point in time. Libraries have multiple locations with dispensers in many of their bathrooms. They maintain their own contract with a vendor and I do not know who that vendor is. And then finally, period products are available through our public health vending machines located in two locations throughout the city. Those are funded by opiate funds and managed by HHS staff and an outside contractor who stocks those and maintains the public health vending machines. I think that's it for my update. I'm happy to take questions or provide additional information as needed.

Any discussion from the committee? Thank you for the update, Director. I had a question on the very last one, that opioid funds are being used for menstrual products. Could you explain that one for me?

Through the Chair, yes, our opiate funds are used to maintain and to rent those public health vending machines, the contract with the company that maintains them. And when we did the initial assessment, which is part of the requirement of using opiate funds, is you need to speak with many people and run focus groups asking individuals who have used drugs, who have been affected by substance misuse in their family or their friends. and obtain feedback about what they need. And we heard loud and clear over and over in our focus groups that they need not only harm reduction supplies to manage their substance use disorder or to prevent an overdose like Narcan, but they need access to basic needs and they need them where they are in the community, not in a doctor's office or in a clinic that they might have to get to. So again, that's why the public health vending machines are opiate funding. and they contain a wide range of public health items, including many survival items that people would need if they are living outside.

Excellent.

Thank you. Thank you for the point of clarification through the chair.

Thank you. Any other discussion? Seeing none, thank you for the update. This item will be laid on the table and mocked or complete.

next item director nigem williams the assistant chair agenda item number seven yes thank you all right agenda item 17 17 id number 26-0106 that the administration provide monthly updates to the committee on public health and public safety on progress towards addressing homelessness in somerville

It's been more than a month, but that's on me. So, Director Carroll, do you have any updates for us?

Yes, through the chair, thank you for the request for regular updates. As you'll see in the report I attached, we are playing around. The prevention team has developed a kind of template for the committee to use if it's helpful. So if there are other topics that you would like me to address on a regular basis, we can certainly add them to this report. So it just kind of groups things to help us all keep track. New services and changes, there really aren't many at this point, other than with the expected heat wave that we are facing. We are very concerned about our unhoused population. So there have been significant efforts and partnerships to ensure water and other supplies are available that people know where they can go to cool down, et cetera. Sheltering service is the next category. I think you are all aware, but in case you are not, that the Somerville Homeless Coalition has been able to open and start operating their new shelter, which is accessible, and it's located in Davis Square, Indiana. It opened, I believe, at the end of May or early June with 10 additional beds that were funded by the city. In terms of day resources for the unhoused, again, our colleagues and partners at the Somerville Homeless Coalition were able to move into a new, larger, many advantages with the space for them and their operations in Davis Square, again, their day engagement center. During the extreme heat, they've been able to stay open through lunch hours, which is also helpful. And the new day engagement center also allows space for additional lockers. So if city staff or DPW do find belongings that are unattended, they can be kept there while we try to locate the owners. Updates from the weekly huddle. Again, this is a huddle that HHS runs, but participants from all over the city, including police, DPW, many city departments, as well as Somerville Homeless Coalition from the outside. We meet weekly. We discuss issues of the statue park pilot, which as Captain Donovan mentioned, are going well so far. Other cleanups pending by the state and outreach efforts on the city's part to make sure that we contact everyone who is in that area in which MassDOT is targeting, belonging policies, things like that. The number of unhoused in Somerville is a question that comes up often with this committee. So I added it to our report. It won't change much through the year, but I don't think I've reported to the committee since the pit count, the point in time was done in January, which is our most accurate count of our annual census of unhoused. The numbers did go up a little bit from last previous year's Unsheltered individuals on that night were 31. And sheltered individuals, including our warming center, were 148 in the city of Somerville. Community concerns. I think the big one was around the warming center. We held a community meeting when the warming center closed. I can't remember the spring at some point there was several residents attended and city staff answered questions and had some concrete follow up items. So we'll come back to this committee as we explore some of the concerns that were raised in the meeting. opportunities to assist I think is always really important when people like to know how to help. We have our website with information about what to do and how to help if you see someone in distress in the city, including reminding people it's okay to call 911. We unfortunately, as you all probably know, had a very tragic death in earlier this spring of an unhoused individual in Davis Square in which people were not able or willing to assist this individual. So we are looking with our teams, with our police, with our emergency management at some kind of a support your neighbor, you know, running with this theme of helping your neighbor, doing some until help arrives training modified for community members who might not know when and how to assist someone who seems distressed. or if people are unsure if someone is in distress. So we look forward to ruling that out as well as some educational materials. Outreach programs, nothing new there other than our police co-response program has started this spring, the pilot, and going well. It gives us more options and points of outreach. The CHW program and the SHC outreach Fenway Mobile Health. So there are a number of teams and we're well coordinated to check on individuals and support folks in the community who are unhoused. And then finally, the category of city resources. We talked a bit about the public health vending machines. Again, the data is great. We are heavily utilized. We can see that people are accessing them after hours, which means that we are addressing an access problem that we thought was there. We have just swapped out our sort of winter survival supplies to more of our summer, our heat exposure supplies, sunscreens, bug sprays, and water, other things people would need in the warmer weather. And again, those are accessible to anyone at all times of the day. And then finally, we just received a Department of Public Health grant to assist with any World Cup FIFA events, watch parties, things like that within the community. The supplies, again, will be additional public health measures that will be open for not only the watch parties, but any member of the public. So it's, again, just another way to make sure that our community is saturated with water wipes, bug spray wipes, things people need to survive in this very high heat. So that's my brief update for now. Thank you for your time, and I'm happy to take any questions.

Well, thank you on that last item. It is incredibly hot outside. It's going to get harder tomorrow. We've previously had discussions about cooling centers. I understand the city has a few set up during the daytime, but none during the evening times. I was wondering if there's been any thought or updates regarding cooling centers for nighttime.

Through the chair, thank you for the question. Yes, there has. We are watching the temperatures actively and we are concerned about the overnight temperatures as well. This week, we do not have a series of nights that move into that very, very dangerous place. But again, these temperatures can be dangerous at any point for anyone, especially if they are outside during the day as well. So we are trying to, again, pass out waters, make sure people know where they can go. The Somerville Homeless Coalition, obviously, is our largest partner with sheltering. They are, you know, will try to extend hours, try to allow whoever they can in, even though their capacity is also limited. So it is definitely something we watch. Our emergency manager, Bill Foster, takes the lead in this, and Lauren, and they are are kind of looking at options should there be a major brownout or a prolonged period of heat where folks are going to need to find shelter. At this point, we do not have any options for that, but we are continuing to think about what that might look like and who might be able to partner with the city to assist in some kind of an overnight cooling shelter if needed.

Awesome.

Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Through you to the Director, Director Carroll. If you could just like I didn't get to look at the report, but I'm just curious. So when we do street outreach and we're trying to figure out what exactly, like, how do we come up with the number of unhoused individuals versus people who may have a place to go, but, you know, either choose to hang out or do we have hard data on any of that?

Through the chair, thank you for the question. Again, our most accurate data is the pit count in January, which obviously is going to paint a different picture in January in the dead of winter than it would if you were to do this again in the middle of summer or spring. But it is the most accurate count we have. We do know that many people will couch surf. Many people will be staying in cars. The pit count will approach individuals staying in cars, and they are counted if we find them and see them. It's a pretty thorough count. And In terms of exact numbers throughout the year, it is very difficult to assess that. There are many, many people who are unstably housed or who are couch surfing or in precarious housing situations. And we know that from our case management. We know that from a number of points in which individuals are accessing services from the city. including our own Housing Stability Office, works very closely to prevent evictions and people becoming homeless. And then on the homeless side, the Summerville Homeless Coalition is, again, working really hard to make sure folks are getting into a more stable permanent housing arrangement. They would have the most accurate, I think, answer to your question on a day-to-day basis, and they could probably give you a pretty good ballpark figure of the number of individuals that they are working with or know in the community who are doubled up or precariously housed.

Okay, yeah, no, thank you for that three, Mr. Chair. I just, you know, we talk about a lot of this in the abstract, especially when it comes to Davis Square and, you know, being a harm reductionist myself and being somebody who's done some street outreach and understanding the challenges of, you know, a lot of times I feel like that translates to people just don't want to see people out there that they don't, you know, and some of those people are building community around, you know, whether it be, you know, a clinic that's in Davis Square or the shelter, you know, Um, so I'm just trying to, this is the first time I've been on this committee in quite a long time. And, uh, first time this committee's meeting because it's been crazy budget season. And so with this issue in front of us, and this is something, you know, Davis Square isn't in my ward, but it's something that we all hear about. And I actually have, you know, the Gilman Square pop-up site is in my area. And, um, I know that I've talked to the individual, at least one individual down there, and I know that he's refused services. But can you just really quickly just walk us through what the workflow looks like? So from our point of view as a city, because I always felt like we have some of these social workers, but I always imagine they go out, they make contact. I don't know if they create a file and have... They're like, as like a case, this is like one of the cases, but I always felt like they probably sort of redundantly like contacted some of the homeless coalition within would go out and. That's me.

Sorry.

And then when someone holds close to. And follow up. So I'm just trying to, I'm just trying again for the public watch or anybody paying attention. I try to understand the workflow of, you know, because people really have this really high expectation of the city that we can somehow. either disappear people or make people go into treatment or, you know, and, and I just, I want to have a frank discussion about at least the workflow about, so they don't call us, but somebody calls us about people in an area. We go down, you just walk us through that.

Just a word through the chair. Excuse me. Thank you for the question. It's complicated. And these, again, concerns come to us in a number of ways. So outreach folks are out there regularly. Our CHWs move through the city a different location each day. So they are rotating through the city constantly. And they may be meeting people, new folks. Some housed, some unhoused who need services or who are just, you know, connecting. They're just connecting with offering food, snacks, water, whatever people need. Again, all the other outreach teams are doing the same. The regular ongoing outreach as well as our Boston Healthcare for the Homeless Clinic that we have, the city is continuing that funding as So they are doing both street medicine as well as a clinic outreach. So there's a number of folks who are just generally going through these areas. The other way that it can happen is absolutely anyone can reach out to us. So it might be a call to 311. It might be through a counselor, through one of you folks who let us know. There is someone I've seen I'm concerned about. There is a new encampment we're worried about. There is an individual in a hammock living in a tree in a park. We want to make sure they're on someone's radar. There was a fire. Sean, who you met earlier, Captain Tierney, he attends the huddle every Friday. They will make sure that we are aware of any incidents during the week of which there were problems or a fire or a potential fire hazard. And so that's largely the point of the huddle is to make sure we're sharing information and not individual names or case management at this point. It is really just a sharing of there is a location, there are individuals need, are they on someone's radar? The schools also intend as well. So sometimes there are overlaps there. And then Usually several outreach teams will be following up with individuals. And again, the services range. Some will be ready to come to the engagement center and start working on a housing application. The Somerville Homeless Coalition, they do housing applications for the unhoused community. The city does not do that. So it's just the way it's divided up. They have the expertise. This is what they do. Our city works with individuals. individuals who are threading maybe in danger of eviction or behind on rent, those kinds of things. So we have these two-to-two arms. Our teams are really clear where to direct people, where to support people. We talk regularly in addition to the huddle. There are conversations between our CHWs and the teams at Somerville Homeless Coalition if they're worried, if there are resources that one needs. We have backpacks through our CHW program where we hand out chargers, we hand out basic supplies, safety items. So they will let us know if there's a need for that. We will reach out if we have been contacted by usually DPW or 311 that there are unattended belongings. And I briefly mentioned some policies that the city has worked on recently. to ensure that if those belongings are found, there is a mechanism to flag them, let folks know, our outreach teams know, they try to find who they might belong to, we put a flag, a tag on those belongings. And then if after, you know, whatever, 74 hours or 72 hours, no one claims them, they are taken down to the Somerville Homeless Coalition to be stored, and they will further try to figure out whose belongings they are. So there is no one linear workflow. In terms of databases, there are certain databases that are capturing a lot of this work. Our community health workers are trialing a platform, a software called the Dimagi software, and they are tracking the work they do daily. So in the referrals through that platform, The SHC Engagement Center will be reporting to the state as well, and they have their own tracking mechanisms. So happy to come back to the committee. And maybe that's something we toy with adding to this report is some referral data. The CHWs could give you a sense of where and how often they are referring people. individuals that they meet in the community or what the common needs and supplies or resources that we get asked for. So happy to, you know, dive into that more deeply in the future.

Thank you, Mr. Thank you, Director. And thank you, Mr. President, through you. Yeah, I mean, that's sounds like I mean, first of all, it's not my order. I don't know that month. I mean, I guess if if it's a monthly, you know, like I mean, if you all are doing all that, I mean, I think it would be clear to anybody watching this meeting that we take this issue very seriously and we're doing everything we can to meet people where they are when they're ready to do what, you know, take those next steps. And I just want that to be on record at this moment because I know that this community is upset right now that we did lose a community member, a woman who was in East Somerville, who, you know, and I know we need to do more around supportive housing. And maybe if there was other options, I don't know that we can solve this as a city and municipality with the lack of funding we have. But certainly there is the question of if there was other options, you know, could her her passing been avoided? But I definitely it definitely sounds like this as a city we're doing and working with our partners doing a lot to. again, support our folks in the community, be it unhoused or otherwise, but certainly getting out there and talking to folks who are unhoused.

So thank you for the work you're all doing.

And yeah, whatever data you can put into any of these reports, I'm sure will be much appreciated. And I wasn't trying to put you on the spot. I was just more thinking like, You know, it would be nice to hear successes like, oh, yeah, we made contact with this one person. And, you know, you don't get details, but like, you know, and then they ended up, you know, and they're currently housed. You know, I mean, those are the type of things that we feel like we're having an impact on what we're doing. So but thank you for this. I appreciate it.

You're welcome. And through the chair, I know Councillor McLaughlin has invited SHC to come. They are the advocates for this population with the most expertise in history here in the city. And they will often come to Friday Huddle and pretty much bring the group to tears with a success story, someone who's been housed finally or something like that. So happy to to share what we have our data and encourage you to invite them as well to give you because they really are the lead agency serving this population in the city.

You're muted.

There we go. Seeing no further discussion, this item will be left in committee. Thank you and good night. Thank you. What do we got next, Director?

Mr. Chair, I'd like to propose maybe taking the items 13 and 14 together.

Let me see these items. Are you, is there anyone from the city here for this?

Yes, PSFA Project Manager, Jonathan.

Okay, we'll take it up. I feel like this is longer than a 30-minute conversation, but let's give it a shot.

Items 13 and 14 to be taken up together. Item 13, ID number 26-0348, conveying public safety for all findings and current initiatives. Item 14, ID number 26-0243, that the Director of Racial and Social Justice provide an update to this Council on the status of the Police-Civilian Oversight Committee.

you have the floor sir thank you mr chair thanks for having me this evening uh credit your composure tonight amid this jail and brown trade so thank you for still holding this meeting amid that um i didn't know until five seconds ago so oh wow um i believe i have a powerpoint to share i know that's the last thing you want to see after two hours but um Because this is my first appearance before the committee, it's helpful for me to be able to quickly walk through, you know, the work I've done since joining the city at the end of 2025. I will be brief, and then I certainly will, you know, be available for questions from you to move forward if that sounds good.

I am curious if we could see what, Madam Clerk, how many more items do we have in committee?

If I'm going to toss this off to IGA director and agent Williams, I have lost count at this point, so it could take me a second.

Director, are there any other items that city staff are here for?

Through you, Mr. Chair, the only other items that city staff are here for is agenda item 8 and 16, and I am here to get those updates. Very brief.

All right. I hate to not give you the due time for this item, but if you could please give a brief update, and then we will ask questions and hopefully get through this. Sorry to keep you waiting. I do like to not go over time because we end up losing track of important issues like this, but please proceed.

Understood. I will be as brief as I can be. So quickly, if you wanna just scroll down, thank you. As you're all aware, yeah, there's a public safety for all process that began with the Department of Racial and Social Justice in September of 2022. This sort of led to the development of a survey that recommended the creation of two public task forces. Next slide, please. that ended up as the Public Safety for All Task Force, the Civilian Oversight Task Force, and the Anti-Violence Working Group. And this led to a number of recommendations and considerations in February of 2025. And I just want to give a quick overview of what those were. The main primary ones from the PSFA Task Force were the co-response model, civil service bid reform, body-worn cameras, civilians in Somerville Police Department, mainly through property investigation and training for Somerville Police Department centered around crisis-informed training. So the next one was the Civilian Oversight Task Force that had a broader task to create a roadmap to creating a form of civilian oversight for public safety in the community that had these primary goals and tasks in mind. Next slide. Finally, there was the anti-violence working group that had a number of recommendations centered around a public education campaign around transit safety, gun and gang violence, connecting youth to community programming, domestic violence ideas and engagement topics that were discussed along with an idea for quarterly meetings with stakeholders to discuss and share existing data in the community around domestic violence. Next slide. So as part of my onboarding at the end of 2025, there was sort of a three-month process where I had the opportunity to speak with 16 city departments as part of sort of a formal interview process. And I submitted a findings memo from this that discussed both sort of the recommendations directly that came from the Public Safety for All Task Forces. I believe there was something like 72 subtask recommendations that I cataloged. along with broader sort of conversations around how public health and public safety collaborate with one another in the city currently, and the opportunities and challenges for departments to do so moving forward. So I can quickly move on to the current initiatives chair, or if you'd like to ask any questions around that background before I proceed. Thank you. So I want to just go quickly over some current initiatives that have occurred in 2026 so far. So obviously we applied for a co-response grant in January of 2026 with the Department of Mental Health. We are still waiting to hear back from the states on that grant. The hope is to fund full-time staff positions for the co-response program through that grant in the future. We will keep you updated when we hear back on this grant, obviously. In the meantime, we've launched this pilot in June of 2026. This is seeing the community outreach health and recovery staff worker engage in eight hours of co-response, two days a week, four-hour shifts, to evaluate the pilot, evaluate sort of what comes up when co-response occurs in the community, best practices as we learn for moving forward with full program implementation. We've partnered with Summer Stat on the evaluation of that pilot. We've also had the Harvard Kennedy School complete a qualitative and quantitative study on dispatch protocols and sort of strategies for future implementation in the years preceded if this program were to move forward. Next slide. As you're all aware, we applied for a grant at the end of 2025 for body-worn cameras. This was one of the first tasks that came across my desk when I took the position at the end of 2025. As you're also aware, we received an award in March of this year that we have been awarded $231,000 to implement the procurement and technology for this program. And we've been working with the council and community stakeholders ever since to move this forward via the surveillance technology ordinance and to also ultimately have the grant funds approved by the city council. I will note that that grant will expire August 31st. And we have reached out to the state on this matter, and there will be no contract extension for the grant itself. And so if we do not end up approving this by the 31st of August, those grant funds will go by the wayside. Wanted to be very clear on that this evening. Next slide. I'll be brief on this. This has been an initiative that came out of my broader conversations with public safety and public health staff around the idea of how they collaborate with one another on issues of substance abuse, mental illness, the unhoused population in the community of Somerville. There has been a number of asks from staff on how they can collaborate more intentionally on the hardest cases here in the community. And I have been deeply exploring the idea of a hub situation table model. This is sort of taken steam in the community of Chelsea in just since 2014. This basically addresses to create a wraparound service in a very intentional way for the most emergency based cases that come up in our community that are raised by either several police departments, health and human services or external partners that may participate in the model like this. I'm really excited about this idea. And at this point, we're working currently with staff and external partners to try to move this forward. And we'd love the opportunity to talk about this more with you all in the future. As I know, our time is limited. This is a larger project than I'm really excited about, but wanted to make sure it's on your radar moving forward as the administration and myself are excited about it. Next slide. As the other agenda item referenced, part of my blogging work as onboarding was the implementation of this civilian oversight forward. I wanted to give a quick update on that here. We've had conversations with Cambridge on their model. Their executive director has been very helpful in conversations with me on this. Obviously, you're aware of the existence of POST. as a state entity for public safety oversight in the state, which is complicated matters and getting this off the ground or sort of understanding the mission and task of it with the state involved currently through POST. But we've heard loud and clear from folks that people want to move forward with this. So we've created a job description for our Police Accountability Board program director. We put that in the budget this past cycle. We're excited to move forward and work with the council on this, on establishing an ordinance to create this. I will say, you know, we're hoping that body-worn cameras will be an important tool for this Police Accountability Board in the future. As I've heard from task force members on both of these task forces, that they believe it's an important cog in the ability to practice actual accountability and oversight for the police if we are to move forward with this recommendation. Next slide. Lastly, I've held a number of one-on-one meetings with former task members, both constituents that live in the community and subject matter experts, or in the case of many people who are constituents who are also subject matter experts on these issues and more. And we're continuing to have community involvement through this community education work, through work reaching out to the council themselves as these issues are debated and discussed, and keeping them abreast of all the incredible work they did and how we're moving forward with it in the future. So I will stop there and answer any questions you may have, Chair.

Thank you. Clark, could you please pull up the agenda items again?

And I counted, we have five left. 6, 8, 10, 12, 16. All right, thank you.

Well, can you pull up the current items, pull it up on the agenda?

13 and 14, Chair. 13, 14, thank you.

Okay, that explains it. So 13, let's see. Well, you provided us an update. Thank you for that. And the other was a communication. I'm very excited to hear about all the things you're doing. Unfortunately, I think this is not the committee that needs convincing that you're doing good work. So I have no questions. I like what you're talking about, and I support it. Councilor Klingin.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, through you. So the second order there, 14, it says the status of a police civilian oversight committee. We're calling it something different, right? In your slideshow, you just said, what is it called in the?

Yeah, through the chair. We're calling it the Police Accountability Board.

Okay. And there was a position put in. So the update basically, like there was a position put into the budget for a director, right? And I guess we can, like you said, go over another time, sort of like build on the presentation that you showed as far as questions we might have around what that body would ultimately look like, how would it be constituted? Is there a framework for that already? Is that in the, oh, I think we have somebody's hand up.

Director Nigel Williams.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just piggybacking a bit on project manager Hillman's presentation, the goal of the administration is to have this body at the start of calendar year 2027. But before that, the hope is that we can get an ordinance in place that describes the functions, the composition, the rules of what that body is. And I know that Project Manager McHillman is being a key part of that, getting the infrastructure set up so that when the names escape me right now, but the position that will be overseeing this body is here. It's kind of a nice little handoff in the work.

Thank you, Mr. President. That sounds like a pretty tall order considering, you know, as a body, you know, we're on break and then we come back. I mean, it sounds pretty ambitious, but maybe, you know, calendar 2027, maybe it may be possible. All right. So this forward motion, this is moving. This is great. I know. Thank you to the work that you did as the director of RSJ and A lot of this happened under you. But yeah, thank you to the current director of, oh God, man, this is too many titles. What is your official title? Yeah, through the chair. It's Public Safety for All Project Manager. Project Safety for All Public Manager. Okay, Public Safety for All. All right, yeah, so thank you for that. And yeah, looking forward to hearing more in the future.

All right. I appreciate it. Again, not to be facetious. I think it's good stuff. I have no questions. And I look forward to a similar implementation. These items will be laid on the table and mark work complete. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Next item, Director. Let's see what we can do.

Through you, Mr. Chair. Agenda item 16. Item 16.

Any update there? Yeah, please read the item.

Item 16, ID number 26-0108, that the Commissioner of Public Works install privacy film and replace the shades of the women's bathroom on the second floor of City Hall.

Any updates?

Through you, Mr. Chair, this work was completed, I believe, in February of 2026.

Excellent. This item will be laid on the table and marked work complete. Next item.

Agenda item, do you Mr. Chair, agenda item number eight?

Eight? Yes. Okay, please read the item.

Item number 8, ID number 26-0825, that the administration submit a written report to this council regarding the timeline and process for staffing the Americans with Disabilities Coordinator role and update this council on the plan to process ADA complaints and accessibility coordination when this position is vacant.

So there's no more city staff here, correct? No one's waiting on us?

No, there's no one else.

Okay. Do you have an update on this?

I do Mr. Chair, I realized that this item was also like part of this communication went to HCDE. So we provided that memo and so the memos here, it somehow was separated in that way, but all that to say the ADA coordinator, the role that was traditionally the ADA coordinator has been updated. Oh, thank you Clark for putting up this memo that kind of conveys the information. So key things, the ADA coordinator has been transitioned into the ADA coordinator and investigator position. This position will live in resources. Moving forward, the position was posted on May 20th. It has since been taken down. We've received a lot of great candidates. My understanding from our human resources team is that folks are moving through phone screens and presumably first rounds will be following soon. In the interim, our chief administrative officer, as well as our engineering team, and folks from RSJ and the mayor's public liaison have been, any resources have been filling in the gaps where appropriate for the tasks and responsibilities that were previously under the ADA coordinator.

Okay, what was the ADA coordinator? That's not a real question, don't worry. Councilor Klingon. Yes, this is great. That's a great update.

You guys move fast. I love it. I love C-Action. I think that's a smart idea to couple it with the investigator because I think, you know, a lot of the complaints are ADA related. So I think it makes total sense to me. Housing and HR, you know, that's neither here nor there, but I think it's a decent enough place for it. So thank you. All right.

I know Mr. Chair, through you, to concentrate, just to be clear, the ADA coordinator investigator position is not merging the pieces that was previously with the RSJ investigator. This is predominantly going to be HR-focused investigation and ADA-related items. So this role will not be taking on the work that was previously under the RSJ investigator position. But I believe I could, it's helpful I could also find the job description and send that along so that folks have a clear understanding of what this new role will be doing.

Very good, thank you.

Yeah. All right, this item's laid on the table. Mark, we're complete. All right, let's see what more we can get in six minutes.

Mr.

Chair.

Yes. One of those items is like a public comment, and I didn't know if there was any written communication that we didn't get, or I know obviously the animal control office is not here, but I didn't know that the letter is directed to the administration as far as, you know, what more we can do to curb off-leash things. So I'm just curious if we can't address that one now, maybe keep it in committee, but I think it's worth addressing.

Let's keep it in committee. We'll keep that one in committee. And what's the next item?

Chairman Goffman, if we could just quickly read that into the record. Okay. So it's item number six, ID 26-0914, Christopher Russell submitted comments regarding off-leash dogs, and that will be kept in committee. Thank you.

Thank you. Next item. Is there anything else you need director out of order? Can we just return to the regular order of business?

Mr. Chair, I believe the regular order of business.

Okay, we'll start back at the top.

I believe we just have items 10 and 12 remaining.

Let me read them real quick.

Well, it's trash browser latches. That's yours.

Oh, yeah. Let's keep that in committee unless you have an update. Do you have a quick update on that director? Read item 10. No updates. We'll keep it in the committee.

You can read it in the committee. I don't think we don't need to read the item if we don't take the item up.

It'll just be presumed to be left in committee. Got it. And then let's see. Neighborhood Council submitting. Let's keep that in committee as well because I have more questions on that. Are those the last items? to okay well i think we got a lot done in a very brief period um thank you everybody i would know unless there's any further discussion anything for you director thank you very good uh council clinger moves to adjourn and i guess we'll take up the items as well first so do you want to do that together separately we'll do it all together

Okay. On approval of the minutes, items one and two and adjournment. Councilor Stresa or Councilor Saeed? Councilor Klingon?

Yes.

Chair McLaughlin?

Yes.

All right. With that, it is 8.58 p.m. and those minutes are approved and we are adjourned.

All right. Thank you, everyone. Good work.