Town Council - Regular Meeting

Welcome to the May meeting. We're going to uh stand for the pledge of allegiance. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you. We have uh the public comment period which allows the opportunity for the public to come forward and discuss non-aggenda items. No action can be taken by the council, but we have the opportunity to listen. Uh, Mr. Davis and Bolster.

Good evening, members of the council and the public. Uh, as you all know, this is the 250th anniversary of the revolution that founded this country and Warren is doing a lot of things to celebrate the history of that uh including uh some walking tours which begin this weekend and as part of that uh we've created a map showing uh the 50 plus homes that are still standing in Warren that were here during the revolution. And uh this will be available all over town. So people can take the tour on the on their on their own or they can come and take the guided tours uh this weekend and another weekend in June uh with rain dates available. Um in light of that I come tonight as a bit of a canary in the coal mine. You know, Warren uh created its historic district and and put a focus on historic preservation 50 years ago with people like Bonnie Warren, Lombard Posey, Ed Thiever, and many others who I told the town and they were a small minority at the time that this is important that we should save these things for future generations so that we can learn from our history and preserve it. And yet here we are 50 years later uh facing many buildings in town that are about to be demolished by neglect. And one of them is the building next door to Waterd Dog uh which the community fought long and hard last year to uh get the community to stand up and say this is important. We need to save this building. And the town just denied the demolition permit. And now all of a sudden uh the building for some reason is now a public safety hazard and there

people have seen it. It's all roped off and boarded up and evidently it's about to be torn down. Um the Bristol County Water Authority has two historic buildings that u they've neglected for 50 years and now all of a sudden is an urgent situation that they want to tear down. Um, and it could be an amazing gateway from the east part of town if they were brought back to life and uh put into commercial use of some sort. It's on the river. It could be a multipitude of choices of ideas. Um, the building at the bridge, the National Grid building is crumbling as we speak. And I know we own it outright, but I think we need to uh do something to at least keep the weather out while it's in litigation and uh take care of it to keep the weather out so that it doesn't deteriorate any further. Um, the Industrial Trust Bank on Main Street, uh, the roof has been leaking for at least 10 years. is now the inside is filled with black mold and at the rate it's going uh that could deteriorate uh in an accelerated fashion. So I come here to just raise the alarm. This isn't about anybody personally. There's property owners, there's town officials uh that are involved in all these things. And I just want to raise the alarm that if we do nothing, all these buildings will come down. And future generations will look at us and say,"Wh did they let these buildings come down?" And at this point, the answer is because we did nothing. And a lot of times it doesn't take money. When we saved the waterfront 25 years ago from condominiums, uh we had no money to work with in the beginning. But because we stepped forward and said, "This is important," we ended up raising like $10 million to pull off that project.

So anyway, keep it within three minutes. That's the alarm and I hope we do something to save these buildings. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next we have uh Ned McGrevy.

Good evening, Mr. McGrevy.

Good evening. Thanks, Joe. Uh yeah, I stood before you guys maybe 15 16 months ago regarding the uh illegal outhalls down at Clock Road. Mhm. And at the time in a nutshell basically is that if we found something that was untored, we would fix it. We would correct it. And we certainly found that these are in their third decade, I believe, of blocking uh the public's access to the Kiku River. Although the shorewood pieces of these out halls were uh the harbor commission took care and got rid of those which I was the only thing connecting anybody to to it. But in any case the the ones the most egregious that are out further are still there and I'm just wondering it's just inertia. I you know I played hide-and-seek with the council and the um CRMC de

I can give you a quick answer. Okay, we're looking at the funds. We don't have it right now that we wanted to put towards that and we're hoping that maybe the possibility of a of a better way to come around to get them down. Uh that's the the nutshell. Bringing a barge in there or a crane or cutting them down uh doesn't seem to be uh a safe method that we are going to get into. If somebody private wanted to do it, that's a different story. Uh because probably if I were down there, I would have done something like that. But uh in regards to okaying a town employee to go there and cut it with a chainsaw dead heads, right? It's not a possibility and looking at the ties. It's only next week and a couple of days in the middle of June where you could even get near them,

right? And then it's the end of September and that's it. So we're not ignoring it. I'm giving you the the straight skinny right now. That uh Well, I appreciate that, but I would I would add I mean, pushing 20 plus years that they've been sitting there um I think is insulting enough that maybe we could find a way. Well, we're hoping that maybe if we see a dock company that's in the area that possibly we could then maybe get a a better price on Yankinum. Uh that's really what we've kind of thought about. Uh but right now uh we have potholes to fill and the highest priority isn't to get rid of four uh telephone bulls in the water. Okay, thank you for your time.

But we're we our hover master is aware of it and we're going to be taking a look at whatever you know doc uh company may go up to Kiki and be in the area uh and and possibly be able great job too by the way starting with Ed Cabraw and and now Jill. So that that's that's our se that's our public secret plan that we're that's what we're trying to do is maybe piggyback on somebody that's in that area with a crane. Okay. Thanks. Thanks Kristen Reed. Miss Reed.

Hi everybody. Kristen Reid um Cherry Street and the director of the Warren Health Equity Zone. Uh, so I wanted to share about two opportunities that are coming up. On May 16th, I want to leave some of these at the side table. On May 16th in the morning, we're going to be doing a a um a Burr Hill uh sort of uh volunteer day. So, in collaboration with the tree commission, green infrastructure center, and the Warren Hez, um there were 40 trees and DPW, there were 40 trees planted in the fall for the arboritum that's there. We've had a good snowy winter, but we now need to turn to volunteers that are watering these trees in the spring, summer, and fall. And to to give them their best start, the plan is to install tree donuts or tree diapers um and some mulch. And um we're going to need all hands on deck. So, we invite everybody to come on down. Uh bring gloves and a rake and some water um because we really need your help. So, that's the first thing. Um the second thing is to invite folks to a uh Warren walk um on May 21st. Uh there's going to be a habitat restoration walk. This is a project with the Warren Conservation Commission on which I am a member. Save the Bay, uh, Bristol County Water Authority and Rhode Island Crant, and, uh, join Wenley Ferguson of Save the Bay, Steve Cutu of the Bristol County Water Authority on a tour of the habitat restored at the water, excuse me, the Warren reservoir where the dam was removed. Bring your binoculars for bird watching and to see the the healthy indicators of this habitat that is coming back. So, you're all invited. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Thank you. Am I wrong? Isn't there something coming up on the 16th? That was the first thing I talked about last time. It's okay. I was reading something. No, it's not. Wanted to make sure it's not. Thank you. Um, okay. I'm in the room. Uh, next we have Yes.

I didn't sign up, but and I neglected to put this on the agenda, but I'd like to point out that uh Brian Sullivan, town manager, um, point out that uh, this week is National Police Week. Um, I know that our police department does does a wonderful job here. They they don't really seek out recognition, but during this week, I think it's important that we do recognize them for everything that they do uh day and night for the the residents here in Warren. And uh uh members of our honor guard are actually participating in National Police Week in Washington DC at the police memorial this week. So, I I just wanted to point that out to the council. Thank you very much and we're proud of them. Next we have the Baps Charities which is a walk run the spirit of service. Dra Patel. Uh hello. Did I say that right?

Um how do you say it? Dearra.

Dearra. There you go. Thank you for that correction. Uh good evening everyone. My name is Dra Patel and I am here to speak to you all today on behalf of BAPS Charities, a charity for which I have been volunteering for almost my entire life to personally extend an invitation for our annual upcoming walk-athon at Folt State Park on May 31st. We will be raising funds to support the Rhode Island Food Bank, the Shar and Sustainable Coalition, and BAPS charities ongoing initiatives. For those of you who may not be familiar with our organization, BAPS Charities is a nonprofit global organization founded in the year 2000 driven by volunteers spanning across nine countries in five continents with our motto being in the spirit of selfless service. As a volunteer-based organization, we are dedicated to benefiting diverse communities through selfless service and have pioneered efforts in multifaceted approaches such as educational services, environmental protection and preservation, health and awareness, and humanitarian relief. For example, some of the work we've done on an international and national scale have included providing relief services in Ukraine where we helped over 1,000 refugees affected by the conflict along with organizing over 1,000 walk-athons in the past 20 years. The funds from these walk-athons have supported local hospitals, children's organizations, and major national beneficiaries such as the Susan G. Kman Foundation and the Nature Conservancy. We've also distributed meals, provided accommodations, and delivered medical aid during times of crisis, including PPE during the pandemic and local efforts such as medical aid during the LA wildfires. In addition, we've held over 500 blood drives across North America, collecting enough blood to s help save more than 56,000 lives. On the education front, we've built over 55 schools in disasteraffected regions and awarded over 5,000 scholarships each year to

disenfranchised communities. We've also been an act we've also been active in environmental efforts planting over 1 million trees as part of our commitment to sustainability. From a local standpoint, our chapter in Sharon, Massachusetts, has organized a couple of initiatives which have included a food drive for which the goods were donated to the first congressional church, a Sharon food pantry, and a toy drive was done as well for toys for tots. We've also done a school supplies drive during the beginning of the school year. And in conjunction with the national efforts, including the walk-athons and blood drives, our local chapter has absolutely been a part of this joint effort as well. As I've mentioned previously, I've been a volunteer for BAPS charities from a very young age. I remember growing up in New Jersey and participating in these walk-athons with my family. And when I was in second grade, being a part of this organization inspired me to help serve those that were affected by the earthquake in Gujarat, India, where I assisted my class in raising money through a toy drive to help support the funds that were being donated for that disaster relief effort. And as I've grown older, I've moved across the country away for school. I've lived in California. I've lived in Michigan. I've lived in Massachusetts and now Rhode Island. and I've been able to find a home in every new place I've been because of this organization and its national efforts uh that I've been a part of. And as I've mentioned, we've been raising funds to uh support this year's uh beneficiaries for our walk-athon. And engaging in that selfless service uh has made me feel very connected to this community that I've been recently a part of. Um and I see that same level of sentiment and connectedness in our youth volunteers. Even today, we've spent the last couple of weekends canvasing outside grocery stores such as Shaws and Clemens Marketplace. And surprisingly, this effort was led by a few young boys all around the ages of 9 to 13. And when I asked them what inspired them to give up their free weekend to stand outside in the cold for hours on end, one of them gave me a response and said, "When I

thought about how the work that I could do could mean that someone could have an extra warm meal or something to drink, I wanted to do everything I could to help them." And it's that level of emotional maturity and sentiment that truly inspires me to keep serving the community that I'm a part of. So with that being said, I want to thank you again for giving me a few minutes to take up your time today and letting me speak about our organization and the impact we've made and hope to continue to make in our communities. And we would really love for you to join us in a couple of weeks for our walk-athon. People can register online. Yes. And I also will leave a couple of extra flyers um in that table over there. But if one you did such a great job. Thank you. Oh, thank you.

Um, if we wanted to write you a check and send it, how would we It We just do this. Yeah, exactly. That QR code would be sufficient. Yes. Thank you so much. Is that what is it? Is it an acronym? And if so, what what is it? It's not necessarily an acronym, but it's it's more so a derivation of the uh spiritual organization from which the uh charity organization was derived, but is not necessarily directly affiliated with, but it is related to that name. Okay. But yeah, thank you so much. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thanks.

Next, we have a couple of resolutions and uh one is uh for the town of Warren. It's a resolution on opposition of House Bill 7676 and Senate Bill uh 2612 relating to state affairs and government open meetings. Now, when this uh bill first was brought to our attention, we thought it was going to be uh very ownorous on the town and uh require a lot of responsibility. And I think Miss Cronin has some words she'd like to uh thoughts on this she'd like to share with us and we'll take it from there.

All right. Um thank you, Mr. President. Yeah, myself and um Councilman Trombbley had discussed this. Um, I think the original understanding of this bill was that it would have a financial impact on the town. Um, as it stands, the town is in compliance with offering the um opportunity for people to watch council meetings, planning and zoning and voluntary historic district committee meetings live stream. So, we are we are in compliance. the language. Uh, Councilman Trombbleley, the lawyer on the, uh, on the board, uh, has some clear language of how we would like to see this, uh, resolution amended so that we can in fact support it because I think it does have value. Um, it is written in the spirit of serving people with uh disabilities and whether they be mobility issues, seniors and whatnot so they can have access to participation or just viewing uh these public meetings. So with that, I'll hand it over to Councilman Trombbley.

Thank you. So, just to go back, essentially what this bill does is it expands the scope of how people can view and participate in town boards and commissions including town council um virtually and that's generally a good thing like we have said, but we want to make sure that the changes are and we our belief is that this bill was intended to be permissible. So, it was supposed to allow towns to be able to shape how much they wanted to do versus or or not depending on what they can afford and whatnot. Um, however, there's a few sections in here that are requirements rather that rather than uh permissible. Um, now I I discussed it with the town manager. Essentially, one of our concerns or one of my concerns is that in this bill, it provides that if we're live streaming one of our council meetings or one of our board meetings and that feed were to die due to technological failure, the meeting would have to cease and the business of the board would have to end. I don't think that's a a a good idea because then we're at the mercy of technology. Um, so I would like that to be amended. In addition, section eight of this bill, which is I know that none of us have it in front of us, but I pulled it up. It's on um page six of the bill, requires that beginning on January 1st, 2028 that we have to allow uh persons to participate virtually. Um what that would mean is that if anyone was watching I hope people are watching this at uh through the link but if they are watching it then they would also have the part the ability to participate and to speak on matters before the council. I know that

that's somewhat common in larger cities such as Cranston, Pucket, Providence perhaps, but it's quite an expensive endeavor for us to to go about uh facilitating. And I believe that that should be a permissible rather than a mandatory requirement on town. So, I'd like that amended. And then lastly, there's a separate section in the bill that requires that people who are watching this virtually uh have access to the materials and we're each given a very lengthy, very numerous packet of materials which is uploaded online and shared to members of the public. You can all find that on our on our website. I want to clarify that the amendments to this don't require that we have to produce a a hand copy because that's going to exacerbate our our expenses with our copying and printing budget. So with those three changes made, I think in principle the rest of the bill is sound. So I would support a resolution that would uh request amendments rather than opposing the bill outright. And I think that would get us more success than just opposing it. So that would be my suggestion.

Well, as I look at this and think about it, I I'm in opposition to this uh the way it's written. And I've found uh it always best to oppose the bill and the opposite actually of your advice unfortunately is to oppose the bill and then um ask for the amendments. Uh, is there any other Well, I don't think we're legislators that we can go tell them what to do, but we're in agreement with you. I would say that we oppose it and then Derek, you can give them the reasons why and let them come up with something better because in essence, what you just said is we are against this.

In its current format, I'm not I'm going to oppose it, too. I haven't really seen much come out of there in the past year that I would actually not oppose. Uh, so I'm against this anyway. So I just ask one last thing that when we Go right ahead when we have these these and I mentioned it to Brian whenever we have these resolutions reflecting legislations that we get either a copy of the legislation or link so we can look at the legislation. So you know

Mr. Disto I don't disagree with the input of uh Mr. Tomley as well as Miss Cronin in regards to the amendments. Is it possible for us to oppose this and also send our amendments that we would like to see at tonight's meeting? You know, I think the better method would be to say uh you could support it if these amendments were made. Could we put that in our resolution? We don't support this bill because A B C or would we say we support with these amendments?

Clearly, we don't support this legislation. December once at one at a time through me. Let's try to get an answer with these amendments. We can support it with these amendments. I think that's the way to go if that's what the council wants to do. But wouldn't they read? But wouldn't wouldn't that wouldn't that show that we're in support of it because they're not asking us for amendments? That's why I feel like a flat opposition and then sending up an an additional resolution with those amendments. So, let me make a with that specific language. Why don't you do it in two parts? Okay.

Uh paragraph one, uh oppose the bill is written. Paragraph two, if the following amends amendments are made, then we can support the bill. Okay, we can do it in two. Um I'll make a motion to that effect. Is there a second second discussion? So the it would uh how how would that be communicated to the general assembly? Um the town of Warren has opposed this legislation or this bill but would support it if these amendments were made.

And paragraph one oppose uh oppose the bill as currently written. Mhm. Paragraph two. If the following amendments are made, uh, then, uh, the council could support the bill. All right. And Miss Speron, you have our our amendments clearly recorded. Yeah. That Derek gave us our Tony to redo this resolution. Yes. Correct. Yes. This will have to go up hopefully by tomorrow. I can get it. Yes. I believe there we'll meet today or Thursday on this. Do you have any input as the clerk who would be overseeing this? Would you like to share with the council on discussion of this matter?

What think about it? You're the town clerk. Video pass him. It's a good idea. We have a we have a problem already with our cameras and stuff. It will cost us a lot of money if we video. But he said no that we wouldn't do that. Right. Well, we we amend live stream all we have live stream. We've already put out all packet is out there. Anybody can see everything in your packets. So, we we do that way. But as far as somebody communicating with the council, that's going to be tough. Correct. I would have to hire somebody else. We'd have to buy another TV. There's a lot of things that it would,

right? Which which is why we are amending it to say that we it We are permitted to do it but we don't are not obligated to. Right. Most talented cities will want to do the same thing and piggy back on us. Yeah. Mr. Rego, I don't know. You know, if somebody could tell me a benefit to this. I don't know why we want to create more of a liability for ourselves and I don't know why our legislators keep doing this to us. Well, the benefit is supposedly for the housebound who are unable to come who are being barred from public participation. That doesn't mean we couldn't try to to appease them if someone called them needed. So, but it doesn't have to be a law.

Correct. But that you asked for the the reason the logic behind this. That's the reason. Mr. Trumley, you had something to add. Yeah. I just wanted to clarify because I think we're all on the same page that we want public the public to be able to to record and view these things from online. We just don't want it to expose us to any additional costs. I think that the amendments that I've discussed and hopefully Miss Spiron can work with Tony on the amendments to make sure that everything is enumerated. But in principle, it's codifying what we already do in terms of we stream the meetings. We have our documents available online. So if you are a person who is homebound or if you work during meetings, then

I mean I'm just trying to clarify you guys do support that. It's just that we already John John wait a minute. Okay, fair enough. I um if you have want to speak this is I mean it's making we're solving a problem that doesn't exist.

Well, I look at it differently. I believe the problem exists. I also believe that it's difficult enough for me to keep our board speaking on one issue at one time. Uh it's difficult to deal with the public. It's going to be difficult for the president to have a computer here that they would have to look and follow a monitor on who is on that chat line. Uh and and I find it to just be uh a difficulty. If it were one witness, one situation, I think that could be dealt with. I think uh unfortunately looking at the amount of comments that are made online now, there's nothing stopping people from making comments and I think it can just be um unruly. I think it'll open up a Pandora's box with a good uh intention, but I think that it's going to be very very difficult to uh govern. And uh that's why I'm against it. And that's that's one reason why I I would like to just

pass the resolution that were against this bill because even with the amendments, it's still doing something that we really don't need done. Well, and and and it would be much easier down the road to get it the rest of this in there where now it does complicate the heck out of it and cause this. I don't think we need this law. That's why I would just like to vote to not support it. Well, right now the motion is and of course everyone is going to vote right now. The motion on the floor is to uh what uh the two amendments. Yeah. To oppose with uh section one oppose section two amendments.

Oppose this language with amendments. And those specific ma uh amendments were um were they regarding cost at all? Uh so uh basically the meetings can continue even if the live stream gets shut down. Correct. Um the section about just as you're talking about about public participation by video or online that would be permissible not mandatory. And then the third would be that all the documentation post online satisfies our requirements to provide that documentation to the public.

How would we control if you say permissible but not mandatory? How would I be able to control who can participate in in this forum and who can't? Just to clarify, it would it would basically the current language in here says that we the by January 1st, 2028, every city in town shall allow participation, which is public comment basically through Zoom, through the online medium. That's what would add the computer, the extra cost, etc. Um, by making that section a may instead of a shall, it means that we, the council, can decide whether or not we want to have that at our meetings or not. I believe that our council would not, and I would also not be in support of that. Um, and that would mean that we could pass the entirety of it. And for those communities that do want to have public participation online, they can do that. And for us, we can keep going the same way that we've been going. So it would mean that we don't have to do that section if it passes,

Miss Cronin.

And by um doing it this way, by opposing it as written and supporting it with these amendments, we are sending the clear message that to the rest of the cities and towns that here is an uh another option. If we say just we flat out oppose it and it passes anyways because nobody makes the suggestion that it could be amended, we might be obligated. We won't be here. Some of us we would be obligated to comply by 2028. And I don't think anybody wants that. I think we want to retain our ability to make these decisions for ourselves. So putting out these amendments clearly states we're okay with the rest of it. We're doing it anyways. We will and we would like to have the ability to decide whether we want to in uh entertain public comment uh virtually during meetings.

Mr. Disto, can't we be against this and they and then we can also send up these uh amendments? You can do whatever you want. That's what we're suggesting. We oppose it as written. I know, but I I am I feel like it's a little different. I I'm against it. So, so if you're against it and it passes in the in the House and in the Senate, we eat it anyway. We We have to do it. But if we say here are some options to make it better, to work for us, why wouldn't we want to get those out there? What I'm trying to get at is I'd rather vote against it and then separately send amendments. That's what we're suggesting.

No, Mr. Dysto's making you do it. You can do you can do that, too. You can you can separate it. You can do it together or you can separate it. I can't imagine having a screen right here and right now listening to the anybody and everybody who's watching and giving them the opportunity to speak. I I wouldn't be able to do it. You may. Nor would I want to. You won't have to. I understand that. So, uh the motion that's um on the floor will will move the vote. All in favor? I opposed. I nay. Uh I'll make a motion that we uh well let me let me read the resolution. Okay.

So uh here's a resolution in opposition. Whereas House 7676 was introduced at the general assembly on February 11th, 2026 by Representative Speakman and others and Senate 2612 was introduced in the general assembly on February 13th by senators Zura and McKenna. And whereas these acts would amend the Open Meetings Act by placing additional burdensome requirements in cities and towns. And whereas should these acts be adopted, they will impose significant unfunded costs and operational burdens on city and town clerk's offices as well as other municipal body public bodies. And whereas these acts also place serious logistical challenges on specialty boards and commissions such as historical commissions, conservation commissions, environmental committees, boards of canvases that oftent times do not have the administrative support of other municipal boards and commissions. Now therefore, be it resolved that the town council of the town of Warren uh as follows. Section one, that the town council of the town of Warren officially expresses its opposition to House 7676 and Senate Bill 2612 and respectfully requests that the honorable general assembly not enact uh 7676 and S 2612. Section two, that this resolution shall become effective immediately upon passage by the Warrentown Council. To me, the language upfront states it clear. Uh, and it doesn't even mention how the president or chairman of the board is supposed to interact with a computer screen and people who uh want to be on um I mean there could be 50 people online that would want to participate.

So, is there a motion to adopt this? I want to make a motion, but I want to ask a question first. Does the state let people participate remotely when they're in session? No. No. So, it's a it's a do as I say, not as I do thing. I'll make a motion that we pass this resolution rejecting or opposing the states two bills. Discussion. Discussion.

There is a 12page piece of legislation that I know I reviewed earlier today and think that I understand what the spirit of it is. I know that Mr. Trombly has I don't believe either any of you guys have and are just reacting to this resolution that was written out of out of fear and not full understanding of the actual bill. No, I'm I'm reacting to the additional

task that would be applied to me if there was a computer monitor here. And and also they don't even have to be residents of Warren. anyone in the public can come here and have the opportunity to participate in our meetings. I don't understand how this would even be uh achievable when we were under uh when we were all uh in Zoom on Zoom during COVID. Um I don't believe the public participated, right? Oh, no, that's not true because I did participate against a couple of things and scheduled it against me. So, I ran for town council. Yeah, but you you I didn't call on you in the meeting

because meetings I was interactive. No, I spoke at those meetings. I was I was I was on Zoom calls. Okay, so discussion Well, Terry, if it's such a good idea, why doesn't the state do it? Yeah. All right, stop. It's a completely different. So, we can act on this and then we can also act on sending up a letter of recommendations. Well, we have a motion and a second on the floor. All in favor? I I now nay. Nay. Correct. Do you want to take action because we can and send amendments on this legislation? Yes.

I'll make a motion to that effect. I'll second it. And the amendments were clearly stated. Miss Beron, you have them. Okay. All in favor? I Any opposed? Okay. So, n division. Excuse me. I don't know. Did that pass or not? Yes. 32. Okay.

Yeah. I have no problem with the amendments if they I I don't believe they're they're going to go anywhere but I also believe that participation is process and uh we sent up u amendments. Next we have the ton of war resolution in support of house bill H8151. This is the blue wave bond for the coastal preparedness act. And uh this is from planner Aliccastro. And would you like me to read this now? Is that you? Would Sure. Do you think it would benefit your presentation? Yes.

Okay. This is a resolution in support of uh the House Bill 8151, the Blue Wave Bond for Coastal Preparedness Act. And be it resolved by the town council of the town of Warren as follows. Whereas located along the east bay coast of the Rhode Island, proudly known as the ocean state, relies heavily on the health, accessibility, and resilience of its shorelines, beaches, and marine ecosystems. And whereas coastal tourism serves as a cornerstone of the local and state economy, drawing visitors from across the region and nation to Warren's thriving main street, historic landmarks, and natural resources, thereby supporting local businesses, employment, and municipal revenue. And whereas the state of Rhode Island's identity, culture, and economic vitality are intrinsically tied to its more than 400 miles of coastline, making coastal preservation and protection a matter of statewide importance. And whereas the town of Warren has experienced and continues to face increasing environmental challenges, including sea level rise, coastal erosion, flooding, and more frequent and severe storm events, all of which threaten public safety. infrastructure, natural habitats, and the economic stability of coastal communities. And whereas storm surge and extreme weather events have demonstrated the urgent need for proactive investment in resilient infrastructure, shoreline protection, and climate adaptation strategies to safeguard both residents and visitors. And whereas House Bill RI 8151, known as the Blue Wave Bond for Coastal Preparedness Act, proposes a 20 2026 bond referendum authorizing the state of Rhode Island to issue up to $100 million in general obligation bonds subject to

voter approval to fund critical coastal preparedness and resilience projects. And whereas the Blue Wave Bond for Coastal Preparedness Act represents a forward-looking investment in the protection of Rhode Island's coastal communities through initiatives such as shoreline stabilization, flood mitigation, habitat restoration, and infrastructure improvements designed to withstand the impacts of climate change. And whereas such investments will help ensure the long-term sustainability of Warren's historic district, main street, working waterfronts, tourism economy, and quality of life for residents and future generations. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Warrentown Council hereby expresses its strong support for House Bill 8151, the Blue Wave Bond for Coastal Preparedness Act, and encourages its passage by the Rhode Island General Assembly and approval by the voters of Rhode Island. Be it further resolved that the Warrentown Council urges state leaders, residents, and stakeholders to recognize the urgency of coastal resilience investments and to take collective action to protect Rhode Island shoreline and economic future. And be it further resolved that a copy of this resolution be transmitted to members of the Rhode Island General Assembly, the Governor of Rhode Island, and relevant state agencies as an expression of the town's official position. uh step two that this uh resolution shall become effective immediately upon passage. Would you like to give or would the council like to support this action with the information heard as well as let Miss Pollock Castro uh continue her presentation?

I just would like to make one technical amendment, Mr. Solicitor. I forgot to include the Senate companion bill as part of the language. Yes. So, I'd like to just include um Senate Bill 3181 and include Senate Bill 31 81. I'll make that motion to amend the resolution. Second. All in favor? I. I'll make a motion that we approve the resolution as amended. Second. All in favor? I. And do you have a anything you want to add to this?

So, I just want to let you guys know. We are considered a blue wave economy community. And similar to last month when we introduced a resolution to make us a safer streets for all community, next month I will be introducing a resolution to make us a blue wave economy community. It is part of our comprehensive plan. Um the pros of this general obligation bond should it come on the floor for a vote and then the voters make their decision for the state in November. The pros for the town of Warren far outweigh any cons. So if it makes it to the ballot in November, some of the things that are going to be beneficial to the town of Warren is that the funding is going towards climate resiliency infrastructure, which is some of the most expensive infrastructure projects that any municipality or state can take on. Um not maybe not as quite as expensive as bridges, but pretty close. Um it's going to provide economic and workforce development. It's going to give targeted investment. So when you think climate infrastructure, yes, you're g you're going to think about restoration of beaches or um restoration of pond retention ponds, but it's also can be used for restoration of waterfront and harbors and things of that nature.

Facilities facilities and most importantly is that it can be used as leverage funding for federal match on grants, stocks and warfs. Correct. Correct. You know, um, and we're not talking about projects that are normally hundreds of thousands of dollars. Even stormwater management parks can run into the millions of dollars and there's anywhere from a 20% to 45% match depending on the federal agency you look at for funding. And that's why I am asking you to consider this and I thank you for doing so. You Well, you said pros and cons.

Well, like any So, the con is like any general obligation bond, it raises the state debt. Um, the other cons that I've looked at, I don't think really pertain to us. They're more disagreements among special interest groups around like, well, is this economic development or is it climate resiliency? Does it take away from climate green bond projects versus um economic development projects like bike path or infrastructure? So, those are more internal special interest groups. I think my opinion, and I could be wrong, that the biggest con for the voters is the fact that it raises our state debt. Okay. Any other questions or comments? You passed it. Thank you. Thank you.

Yeah, we already voted on. Next, we have the final adoption of the fiscal year budget 2627. I've already checked with Mr. The systo if anyone wanted to make any changes to the budget such as putting money uh towards a different project since Mr. Hanley last month asked for the possibility of going out for RFQ to for the beach uh the park the bur hill. Yeah. Well, Miss Paula Castro has a couple of words she can give to that. And why don't you please come right up and maybe this would

so help initiate a change in that uh

line. So last month you tasked me with putting out together an RFP. That RFP is almost complete. I needed some assistance from an architect. Um so one of the architects locally donated her time to help me clean up that language. That RFP will be ready to go out probably within the next week after speaking to some architectural landscaping firms landscape architecture firms. Um you can anticipate engineering design work to cost between $50 and $100,000. I think it's going to be more on the 50 side just on the nature of the size of the project. What I am asking at this point is not necessarily for you to include additional funding additional $22,000. However, what I would ask is that the funding that has been set aside for restoration be held as a Burr Hill contill park contingency or however you code it um until we can get those RFP back so I can bring them to council.

Well, the the budget item was for either uh emergency repairs or it's to make safe. In other words, to put a fence around. Correct. So, if it's going to take a while, then we're probably going to maybe we'll have to go the fence around it aspect. Are you saying not to use that money to do what? I was saying to hold off until you get a sense of what it would cost to go for engineering design because that money could be better allocated than Yeah, we don't have to change anything. Engineering design.

We're not building a skyscraper. needs to go out to a land engineering design council. Please know that this needs a landscape architect could present us a plan that would work. John, what I believe she's uh not pointing out is that there's the up to $400,000 grants from DEM. We've been very successful with those. I believe that's who she'd be uh going after the money for to look at this as a water mitigation grant because of the water runoff in that area.

And we can call whatever we want. I said engineering design because that's what I'm used to the terminology plans from a landscape architect. I need the plans in order to make this fundable. I cannot go to a state agency and say well I think well think based on what what are you doing? I show you a picture and a budget, but I need those plans, design work in order to make the project fundable. And hopefully that makes a little bit more sense. Hopefully we can get snow fence that will satisfy the league. That's that was going to be my second surround it. What concerns me is if we use this money for that and then we get something back from the league and the snow fence doesn't work.

Well, we're now we got to rip them out. You disagree, but as soon as those are gone, they're never going back. They're never going back. That's just the way it works. I know those structures aren't. But I believe something better will go there. We have $28,000 in the budget. It's a starting point. Do what you need to do and come back to us when you need more. Okay. All right. Line item is for repair. We need to broaden the line item. That's all I'm asking is for you to broaden the line item. No, I'm I'm still good with the repair. I'm going to keep the repair. I'm not losing that money and then lose the bleakers. We lose the the landscape feature because

Okay, I'm going to open the discussion to Mr. Trombly as well as Miss Cronin as well as everyone. What we're looking for is the flexibility of the language to give the town the ability to make them safe potentially not by repair because 28,000 we know isn't going to do it but also allow the funds to be there for the task that Miss Paula Castro has been given by this council. I get how about we add the money for the task and then if we don't use the 28 grand to make safe we can still have that instead of taking the 28 out. I would support putting money in for the engineering on it.

Okay. You have that opportunity to do that. I'm I'm I'm puzzled. This is asking for the latitude to just expand the language of how that line item is going to read so we can potentially find out what it would really cost to either

uh last month the presentation you all loved that tiered effect that had the concrete front to it that really resembled very much the spirit of what is there now. I think we all agree that what is there now is irreparable to a in a for an amount that we can afford. So if we can do something if we can get something designed and funded that will mimic it and be good for the community for years to come so we leave it better than we found it. I don't I don't know what the problem is there. We're not We are not going to 28,000 is not going to save those or repair those. We We all agreed that we liked what she presented as a potential alternative to what we were all thinking,

which would be the target for the grant. I'm going to give you an A for beating a dead horse because we've beaten the thing to dead. We we plugged in $28,000. We voted. That 28,000 is a starting point to fix it. Now, those pictures she sent, I don't know about you, but I could do it on AI and take a picture of me and it changes me, but I'm still me. Okay, so those were beautiful pictures, but we will never see that over there. That's not true. And what John's saying is true. Once those are out, we'll never see them again. It just be a dirt.

First of all, I'm not actually recommending removal of them at all because I'm not sure what the structural integrity would look like. And I've spoken with public works about this and I've spoken with an architect about this. So I'm not talking about removing that structure till you have a plan. What I'm saying is that I'd like the flexibility and the language of the budget that if we so decide to get and we get an RFP that comes in for design plans, whatever you want to call it, and I can come back before the council and say, "Okay, I got this. These are the bids we got in. This is what it would cost us to go for design. That funding is there and apply for the grant and apply for the grant.

Why can't she come back at that time and ask for us to move the line item? Yeah, you can do that. Okay. Yeah, because if I can't do that if we can. No, you can't. If if it's worded repair, getting engineering for the repair would fall under repair. Correct. It's not the repair. The engineering is for a new project. You need to amend the language for that particular line item at the very least and to make sure you ask fish. What does it say? What does it say? Mr. Do you have anything to add to this since you are so pivotal in the direction that this project is now going in? Yes, I do. Thank you, Mr. President. Feel free.

Uh Miss Pola Castro, what is your suggested language for this particular line item? So, I would say repair, replacement, and planning. Would you be satisfied with repair and planning? Yes.

I'll make a motion to re number this or rename this line item repair and planning. I think that satisfies the concerns of uh my fellow councilman that this would somehow allow it to be the decision of the council uh which represents the will of I think the majority of the people in town to try to repair rather than replace which I think will be cheaper and I think that John does that do you feel that satisfied? I'm looking to see was it was it originally just a line item just was 150,000 to repair that. I'm good with that. I'll second Derek's motion. We're not relitigating this. Yeah, we are. We're not religating.

I second Derek's motion. Thank you. That was a good motion, Derek. I commend you for that. So, the motion is to repair change the repair and planning. Repair and repair and planning for what? What are we planning? restoration of the bleacher. So the RFP you mean is the replacement? So if you want the language that will go out in the RFP, it's a it's replacement is what you is what you're asking for. It basically a tiered terrace and storm water. You mean getting removing what's there and putting in a usable tiered water mitigation aspect? Correct.

Yeah. The planning part is just the the money to get the engineering that she may need if we can use that. Right. So adding that would just open it up for that as well as the repair. But you talked about the replacement of the structure. Correct. We didn't say we didn't say anything. But that's what you guys looked. You looked at the picture and said we'd like to go out for the planning. So that's what the 28,000 could be. And actually, I'm looking at that and I would be repairs, make safe and planning because if if the trust comes back and it's bad, I would like to still have that money to be able to be used for it says repair. Could we use that for make safe? How are we here?

Planning and I actually switch it around for planning and repair instead of repair and planning for planning and repair. If there's a an issue out there that needs to be addressed immediately, the line item recovery, is there sufficient funds to do this? I'm just curious, what are we planning or if we're looking at repair, Mr. Strong? It was your motion. What What is it that we're um planning on if we're looking at repair? The estimates came in at 150,000.

And I think we can I think what we're looking to go out has come to us and presented at the previous meeting. Sorry, John. He just asked me a direct question. Right. Miss Polycastaster presented and said we can make the bleachers look like this. No, that's what that's not what she presented. Joe, what she with the with that money, she needs that to go get the bond money. So the do so we can get if we can get the bond money, not the bond money. If we can get the grant money, then it doesn't matter if it costs fun 400,000. If we get 400,000 in grants. So you are admitting that the that the leeches would be removed. No,

not not it would be a whole big process taken down as they're being rebuilt, not taken down and then 10 years later everybody forgets about it. Correct. So the process of the planning is for the replacement of the bleachers. That's what you're asking Joe. I think the word engineering design to me that's cleaner, but I know that you consider just architectural plans. Joe, Mr. Rego, we've had discussion here. Yes. And I think we're all in agreement. Derek's recommendation motion. Very good motion. I think it satisfies us. Let's go with that motion and down the road when you have some more information, we will revisit it.

Yes. My hope is to get the RFP posted by the end of the month, have it closed right before the 4th of July and on the calendar for review at the July meeting. Okay. Uh there's a motion. Is there a second? I already second. Thank you. All in favor? Nay. Okay. So now we have to take a motion to adopt to adopt the uh budget. I'll make a motion we uh adopt the financial budget as just amended by the wording on that line item and we approve the budget in a whole as a whole. Is there a second? Second. All in favor? I.

Thank you. Next we have interviews affordable housing advisory committee one position. Uh there's uh no one has applied. Next we have the Bristol Warren School District budget and declining enrollment group. Two positions. Mr. Traumley, you've been appointed and uh no one has applied for the other position. Next we have the e economic development board. Two positions. No one's applied. Juvenile Hearing Board, one position, one alternate position, no one's applied. Planning board, two alternate positions, no one's applied. 250th Commission, four, four positions, no one's applied. Voluntary historic district committee, one alternate position available. And Mr. Gordon McDonald. Mr. McDonald, uh, could you come on down? let us know a little bit about yourself and why you would like to serve on this board.

Good evening. Good evening, everybody. Hello. My name is Gordon McDonald. I live at 73 King Street in Warren, Rhode Island, and I've applied for the uh board of uh the historic voluntary historic commission. And um basically I've applied because I've got property in the historic district and um there were no other applicants and some people on the board asked me if I'd be interested in putting my name in. So I did. Here I am. Any questions of the applicant? No. Make a motion to appoint Gordon McDonald. I'll second. All in favor? Thank you, Gordon. I'm your neighbor, you know. I know. Right. Right. Smile. Yeah. Around the corner. Yeah.

You're on. That's it. That's it. Thank you for your time. Next, we have resignations. We have a resignation of the economic development board member, Jennifer Peters, and we'd like to send her a Make a motion we accept designation and send her a letter of appreciation. Thank you. Second. All in favor? Next, we have acceptance of minutes, April 14, 26, regular schedule meetings. I've reviewed them. I see no mistakes. Make a motion to approve. So, is there an amended copy? Yeah, it was it was on the Yeah, I know. Did you see? Was it the amended copy you approving? Oh, I I was approving the ones that were just one amendment digitally.

I'll make a motion to approve the amended copy. Second. All in favor? I I abstain. Yes, Mr. TR is here. Next, we have the consent agenda P1. And is there a motion to accept the consent agenda? Motion. Second. All in favor? I. And next we have petitions. We have P2 request for a vitualing license from East Bay Pickle Ball Club. Is the applicant here? Where are you? Hi. Come on down. How are you? Good evening.

Good evening. Tell us what you want to do with this license. We'd like to sell beer and wine at the East Bay pickle ball club. Okay. Are there any questions to the applicant? Is that comment common at uh these type of establishments that there there's a beverage service available? It is. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. This is the victory license. We'll be getting to yours. We're moving them all together. Uh so this is the one that is about the food vict. Yeah, my mistake. Okay. Um, but it same question, different title. What do you plan on doing with the victualing license, just real small uh graband go food items? There we go. No prep food. Perfect answer.

Any questions in the No, you want to do them both at once or Yes. Well, I'll make I'll make a motion we approve the vitioning license for East Bay Pickle Ball Club. Second. All in favor? Okay. And next we have the yearly entertainment license for East Bay Pickle Ball Club. What type of entertainment you looking? Uh if we'd like to have food trucks, maybe a van once in a while. Nothing. Uh there's a lot of um we have a large parking lot in the back garage doors that are open. We'd like to park food trucks back there and have a food truck night or maybe a band once in a while. Something low entertainment. We're not looking for

Have you met with the police chief or fire chief to go over uh the plan? I've spoken to the fire chief, not specifically about the entertainment license. So, what we can do is make a contingent on his approval if the council passes this and he'll I mean, you have a new building. I'm sure there's not going to be a problem. Uh so, is there a we want to put like hours limit on this? The NFS is different too. NFS totally different. MFS have to be approved by the town of Earth. Well, right now we're doing the entertainment license. Yeah. So, I'm sorry. You said you want to have MFVS. That would be a separate application as well. But we need this one. For the music, you need this for if you want to have any kind of music or any kind of entertainment.

Okay. Understood. I just want to say something because that is all open space. You want to open the garage. Just be um considered that sometimes open space the noise carries. So I'm sure I mean you've done a great job. So just keep that in mind. So I'm just saying if we want to put an end time at 11 o'clock, 10 o'clock, what do we want to do? What time are you looking at 10? Closing. We're not going to extend past closing hours. What time you close? We close at 10, but I highly doubt music will be on past 7 o'clock. Okay. It's probably I I just want to add not pass I'm going to give him till 11 o'clock just in case. But well the pet is fine. Yeah.

All right. We'll give him till 10 o'clock. I want to put entertainment must cease by 10 p.m. Any additional questions to Charlie? Um I just wanted to say on the on the entertainment element of it that uh there is a funeral home across the street from you. So there might it might come time where that might be in conflict. I hope that there isn't. But it's always good to check with them, make sure that your party will not in, you know, impact any of their events. Uh, and then the other suggestion I had was with regard to the entertainment license that if you do end up going beyond that limit, you can always come back to us. It's not a one-time thing. You can always ask for a special dispensation for a particular event. So that's all. Thank you. Thank you. I'll make a motion we approve the entertainment license with our

police chief. Sorry. Yes. Contingent on your approval. Concerns about public the first truck is inv. We added contingent on your approval. Yeah. I'm I was going to make my motion that we approve, but we do not issue until approved by the fire and police chiefs. Second. All in favor? All right.

And now we'll move up the public hearing. And this is a request for a class uh BVL beverage license. Um what would you like to do? What are your plans inside the club? Sell beer and wine to uh people that are over 21 and that would be members only or visitors or what aspect is it going to be open to the public? No, that's members only. Members only. Are there any other questions? I apologize. Not members only. Anybody who's at the facility because you don't have to be a member to play pickle ball there. Okay. But they would have to be there to play pickle ball. Correct. So it's not going to be a bar. Correct. It's not a bar. Mr. Charlie, any questions?

No, I was just going to ask because the gentleman on the left had nodded his head in approval when he said no. So I was like, wait a second. That does not add up. So there's a It's not a bar. You have to play pickle ball in the room. You're gonna be a pickle baller. Yeah. They're gonna be drinking and then playing pickle ball. Wonderful. A bit of luck. Any additional questions under this side? Okay, this is a public hearing. Are there any questions from the public on this matter? Okay, hearing none. Is there a motion? Motion we close a public hearing? Second. I first question is do we have a uh license available? Yes.

Okay. I'll make a motion we approve the uh the BVL license. Uh I'm going to put the same 10 10 10:00 time limit on it as well. Makes sense. Yep. 10 uh the curfew for the selling of the liquor is 10 p.m. Uh Mr. President, this is one where we would ask uh for we would put contingent on police and fire review or do we not need that for this one? I would put it I was going to think put it on the same one because they could get one without the other. Okay, understood. Yeah. So, I'll make a motion we approve with a 10pm curfew. Uh we approve it but not to be issued until uh signed off by the police and fire chief in in all state approvals.

In all state in all state approvals. Yes. We are second. Okay. Questions? No, I was going to say the last conversation I had with the uh life safety director, fire chief was like we're not going to do anything until he walks through the facility one more time. Correct. That's what we're saying. Contingent means their approval. So, we're passing it only based on their approval and how you react to them. Then you can go see the clerk and she'll actually hand you the license, but you don't have the license until she physically hands it to you. Understood. Any other questions? Okay. All in favor? I. Good luck. Thank you.

You're welcome. Next, we have request for a one-day entertainment license from Martha Donovan, 28 Luther Street. Hi Martha, how are you? Good. How are you? Good. And you are at the German club and you have a twoerson band, guitar and singing outside if it's weather permitting. And this is for a birthday party. Yes. Anything you want to add to that? Uh, I was hoping to make an edit to ex extend it to 1000 p.m. in case there's, you know, the band wants to stay on an extra outside. I think that would be difficult. Okay. Maybe. I mean, I'm I'm not sure about how someone travels down there.

What day of the week is it? Saturday. 10 p.m. I don't think that's a killer on a Saturday night. The band is is hired until 9:30, but sometimes stay on for another few songs. I'll make a motion. We approve the one day entertainment license with a curfew of 1000 p.m. I mean, you probably you're going to be on the uh on the water on the water side as well. So, all right. They've had bands before, they said. All right. Yeah. Remember, too loud could be too loud if the police come. Mhm. You have, you know, deal deal accordingly. Second that motion. Mr. Charley, you had something. Oh, I was just seconding it, but it appears Lou has already done so.

Okay. All in favor? Good luck. Good luck. I'm just wondering, do I have to come to get the license? I'll come to the clerk's office. You're welcome. Next, we have page four. request for a one-day entertainment license from Courtney Havl and Daniel Misrai is I How did I kill that name? No, you did good. Oh, thank you. You did good. You actually got it on point. Hightown council members. Yeah, we are requesting a one-day license for our wedding June 27th. Oh, excellent. 3 to 10. We're getting married at Colt State Park. Okay. And you're having the reception at 13 Bay Road.

Yes. My parents house. and uh 3 to 10 as you've noted uh all of your neighbors you get along somewhat. Yes, very much so. Everyone's offering parking. There you go. I was just going to say invite everybody and for sure if they come you're better off. All right. Any questions of the applicant? No. Uh talk I would say have the again the fire chief I'll make a motion to approve come by inspector do whatever. So approve. Yeah. Make sure that they're not blocking the traffic. It'll be contingent on their approval. If you invite him, you might get a gift. Just a thought. I'll make make a motion we approve but not issue until fire and police have signed off. Herb. Second that. Thank you. Appreciate it, guys. Take care. Cheers. Have a great

uh call them and make an appointment. Yes, please. They're not going to call you. Got it. Call and make an appointment. Thank you. Next, we have request for a one day entertainment license from Brian Rafty. And uh you're over on Denver Avenue 31. It's a celebration of life. You have a DJ and you're looking at hours of 1 to 10. Yes, sir. Anything you want to add to that? No, it's been an annual thing since co Oh, okay. So, your neighbors are are included and involved. I live on a dead end. I'm at the last house I have two neighbors. Oh, yeah. I've been I I know exactly where you live. Toby Tvaris's little house, right? Yes, sir. I'm going to approve. Second. All in favor? All right.

Do we want to put this pending fire and police? I'm sorry. It's an entertainment license, so it would be contingent. Make an appointment with the fire and police. Actually, I have a quick question. Yeah, they're going to come and take a look at the facility. I have a question. I've been doing it every year. I've never had them come once. Uh, well, usually we speak. Yeah, they usually call, we talk on the phone, but that's fine. They've never come to my house. And if you do it every year, they're probably familiar with it. So, it's just a phone call.

Yeah. So, what I'm what I'm saying is it's contingent upon them whether they visit your house or on the phone, however that process goes. They have the ability to tell you what to do. And if they come back to us and say, "We're not granting it." That's how this license is being given. I'm sure you won't have a problem, Mr. President. It's the same as what you've done every year. Right. I just I don't see a problem. It's not a problem. We're saying that we're giving you this license with Again, I I understand the contingency. That's all. Mr. President, may I ask a question, ambassador?

So, this is an event that has taken place multiple years in a row and if if we have an event sort of like this, not not your specific event, sir, but just if there is an event where it kind of is an annual thing and we have the police and fire check it out once, do they have to continue checking it out every single year or is once sufficient? Technically, yes. Well, my question to that is suppose there's another house built across the street or the neighborhood's changed. That's why I mean it's a very minor thing. They just if they're familiar with it, they know there was Yes. Every time Oh, I thought you were going to say one one inspection would be good. Okay.

Yes. Every time uh the u uh permit is applied for the uh there needs to be police and in in fire participation. It's a public safety aspect. That's all. I'm sure you won't have any issues, sir. But yeah. Yeah, should be fine. I don't know that. So, uh, all in favor? I. Good luck. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. Next, we have, uh, my old neighborhood. Number seven. This is for a class F beverage license from the Kiki Mulet Village Tenants Association. Elizabeth Farara is president of the association and we're having a banquet for the installation of the new officers.

All right. And I'm very strict with my tips license. Okay. Okay. And are there any other questions of the applicant? No. Motion to approve. Second. All in favor? Thank you. Next, we have request for a class F beverage license from Mr. Anthony Urban. Mr. Urban here. Did we um tell Mr. Urban that did he know he had to be here? This is a new thing. They do this every year, right? Yeah. So, can we Well, St. Thomas Church. This is the new This is the new for the new year. This is different. Yeah. This is different.

This isn't the the piece. So, when is the June um council meeting? June I want to say the 11th. June 9th. Do we have a phone number for Mr. There's one listed on here yet. Can could you make one more call and we can put Yeah. Right now and we'll we'll put this off and and hopefully we'll be able to get in touch with them. Um it's just over on that. So next we have to benefit live in a small town.

Ordinance 01 chapter 4 building and building regulations article 10 automatic license plate reader. This is on private property. This is the first reading. It's continued from April 14th. Mr. Trolley, we continued this so you could be a participant. Thank you. Feel free to take the discussion.

Well, this was what we had discussed at a previous council meeting. Essentially, we have uh the issue we had the issue uh we had the proposal to place cameras in the community by the state police. We uh majority of the council rejected that. Um, and it was brought to my attention that there was nothing prohibiting any individual private person from putting up a flot camera on private property and directing it towards traffic and and essentially functioning in the same vein. So, what this would do, what this ordinance would do is it would simply say if you would like to put in a flop camera on your property on private property, you would have to come and get spe uh permission from uh the town. So it would not apply to things like Amazon Ring doorbells, but it would apply to uh the type of automatic license plates readers that are contemplated when we talk about this. I uh when we talked about this issue several meetings ago, uh Anthony has been uh Mr. Sisto rather has been working on the language for this and um I'm satisfied with it uh that it fulfills the conditions that we had put on it and I think that we should support it.

Uh Mr. the system though. Do you believe we have the authority to tell private property owners what they can do with a uh camera? Well, there are instances where there are regulations that affect the use of private property. As I said to everyone, this is an emerging field. I've uh did some research on it. There are no presidents, so I can't see either way. Did we expect a lawsuit if we denied one? Maybe

that that's difficult to say, too. I'm not so sure that um not so sure that a private property owner would want to push an issue of this nature. Not sure about that. I can't say. But you're you're we're in a situation now and as a lawyer I I I am starting to see this more and more where there are emerging technologies and they're moving um forward on a very fast clip and the law hasn't caught up. So on some of these things um you can't I can't tell you what uh there's no precedence and I'm not sure how that would be handled on this and um you know you can say it's the use of private property but really it's directed towards public streets. So is there an expectation that somebody um um somebody's private property uh can't be regulated in this fashion? I I I I can't I can't say that. But I do think there's a good argument that ultimately this ordinance would be upheld,

but I can't say for sure. Stanley, in my in my business, I have to deal with an expected right of privacy quite often.

If you're in the middle of the street, you have no expected right of privacy whatsoever. Whether it's special detection, whether it's me just looking at your license plate, whether it's me taking a picture of it, there is no expected right for privacy. So, and this I think this ordinance is ridiculous. It's such a knee-jerk reaction. It's it's ridiculous. Everybody's so afraid. Oh, the government's going to have it. Uh the government's going to have it to keep you safe. But yeah, I'm going to vote against this because I just think it's ridiculous. Anyone else have anything? Mr. Rego. Yeah.

Again, my issue is like you you go from Bristol, they allow it, then you go to Baron, we don't allow it. Barington allows it. The end of the day, they're going to get you placed. Question for you, Tony. The state came and asked us for permission. Did they need to?

Well, you know, I got to tell you something because it's been debated. Technically, no, because they wanted to put it on State Street. However, they made a policy decision that they wanted to get permission from local communities. Some communities say yes and some communities say no and the state police has respected that. But you got to put that ordinance to that proposal to the side for this ordinance which goes to private property and it only um only applies to the tunnel warning which I think is a very different thing and the question is different. The question isn't whether or not you can have uh license plate readers. The question is is whether or not you can say to a private property owner that um you you we you can't have a license plate reader that's going to be directed towards the town of Warren streets. So, you know, to me that's a different question. And although there's no precedent, I do think that's something that could be regulated by the town through this ordinance.

Can I continue my question? Yes, you can. So, how do you stop a ring bell that's directed right at a street? I mean, I I can picture on the corner of child and Medic Avenue, there's a house there that sits on the corner. If he has a Ring camera, it's facing the cars. So, we would have to tell to take up No, because it's not directly connected to law enforcement. Yeah. It's not a professional flop camera. Yeah. What what it is is is um we had to do some research on this, but um the uh uh product that is regulated by that would be regulated by the sidens if it's passed. Ring cameras are okay and and

other uh um cameras are okay. Flock cameras which are license plate readers. We use the term flock because that's the company but they they're a RLPs. That's the only thing that would be regulated in this ordinance. I can understand that but at the same time the end result would be the same. Doesn't matter if you come from a flock camera or a ring camera, you have the ability to get that information. Why Why would you be afraid of your license?

So, what I'm I would like to just clarify that when I voted against the state police lack of contract. Number one, they had they didn't have a contract for us. They didn't actually, if we remember, they they didn't have their they said they had a policy, but they didn't provide

they didn't have and they didn't have a contract. So there were multiple issues that went into that. I think this is uh somewhat uninforceable. Um I also felt in my initial voting on that first one was about privacy. So now we're going to tell uh homeowners what to do. I understand Mr. Mr. Trump, you're trying to uh expand this. Uh but I find it very hard and I think Mr. the system is being uh blatantly honest with there's nothing there to say uh that this is um been enforced right this basically doesn't exist anywhere else this is a cuttingedge ordinance so it's not one that I can say to you that I went to another town and I came up with this this is going to be the first one now Warren has been on the leading edge before on things. This would be another one. But at the same hand, that means that I can't tell you that, you know, there's cases on this that say yes or no on this.

It's a new tech it's a new technology. I and it's a new ordinance to regulate a new technology. Yeah, I I find this I find this one hard.

Um, so Mr. Traley, anything you want to add, Mr. Cronin, anything else? Yeah, I I I would just add that uh this is a I mean, not to beat a dead horse, but this is a new technology. It's being used in other communities and other jurisdictions in ways that are problematic and concerning to people that are concerned about their movements being tracked by corporations, by the government, and what data is available. And I understand that the law has not caught up to this technology to say whether or not this is permissible or not. Having looked at similar advances in technology such as cell phones and how the courts have allowed or in in many cases protected the rights of people's privacy within their cell phone location tracking information within their right to not be ha to not have a uh a tracking device placed on their vehicle by you know law enforcement. these are privacy implications in public settings or with public with technology. So I I do think that this is sound. I think that this would hold up in court. I understand though that that uh Mr. Dysto is accurate in saying this is not been tested anywhere. So I understand that trepidation, but I think it's all in service of protecting the privacy rights and interests of the people of Warren. Um, so I would ask to I would ask my fellow council people to support that. Um, and uh, but vote your conscience.

You just say protect your privacy. If these cameras only take pictures, your license plates, your license plates is public information. So what is it protecting?

It's protecting your movement, your right to privacy and your movements. when I go to the grocery, it's not it's nobody's business how often I go to the grocery store or how often I stop off at La Piñata to get a bite to eat or a drink or what have you. It's nobody's business. And the fact of the matter is this technology is becoming so advanced that it can track not only license plates but also the details, bumper stickers, it can track dents and all sorts of things and we don't even know where this technology is going in a way that's being used and abused in other jurisdictions and we don't know about it. And that's why I think it's important that the town council not pro prohibit these cameras entirely, but at least have the folks that want to put them in come to the council and say, "Here's where we want to put it. We have a privacy interest in doing so." And if the council agrees, then there's no issue. And if the council doesn't agree because it exposes a huge amount of people who travel every day and warrant to to constant surveillance, then that's an that's a privacy issue that we need to protect. Councilman Trombbley, when the presentation was here and the only way that that license plate what was presented to us is the only way that license plate would get put into that system is if there was already a case number or an investigation number. Our police chief wouldn't even have had access to it would go to the two detectives. So to say that somebody wants to see how many times you're going to the grocery store, unless our detectives are really interested in what you're having for dinner, I don't think your camera is going to go in there and it would be illegal for them to put your plate in there without the case.

So not to play devil's active, but in that instance, if it were the state police and it was in conjunction with the Warren PD, that'd be one thing. If it were in on private property, I think you'd have less of that um law enforcement buffer on this. But who else is going to be if if if who else wants a flop camera besides law enforcement? I think that Mr. Tromley's point you just made me reading this. You don't know which law enforcement agency me would be doing it. You really wouldn't have any control.

Me reading this a second time. Uh what he's looking at is it would be coming in front of the council for permission is all he's looking at. Not uh it would not be a total ban on these. It would not prohibit them. It it's just saying that if the council ever feels that if it's placed in a location that's inappropriate that exposes too much of the privacy interest of use whatever or an inappropriate use then we could absolutely uh prohibit that and I I think that's excellent what we should support. Okay, let's move the question. Is there a motion? Motion. Second. All in favor? I I opposed. Opposed. Okay, now next we have correspondence.

We go back to Oh, yeah. Mr. Urban, where are you? There you are. I am so sorry. No, I'm glad glad you answered the phone. Right. And I got it right here. Glad you took off your hat. Right. Out of respect for all of you and I I greatly apologize. So my name just know a little about what you're doing and and Sure. So I'm representing today uh St. Thomas the Apostle. Um they've now joined with St. Mary of the Bay. We are talking about their feast that they have every year. Oh.

So their feast is this year the um 20 and the 21st. But they do this um thing called a Maduro that I was just recently brought up to speed with. Okay. Thank you.

Um and you see I'm still learning the pronunciations. Um the madun. So during the mun this year um which would be the 15th through the 19th they would like to serve um wine and beer but I limited the beer to the 16th and the 18th because I know we need police officers and it would just save the church some money. So, I'm in front of the council to ask for the um licensing that we can do this um at the church. And if you have objections or questions, please feel free to ask. I'm sorry, Joe. Yeah, please.

Because on your on your um application says June 14th to the 19th, you don't want that. No, it's I'm sorry. It's the 2 um the 15th through the 19th of June of June. But this is something you do every year, right? This is um something that they've added this year. The medum. So, let's get the correct dates. 15 through the 19th. Okay. Number one. Are there any other questions? Yeah, he changed it. Yeah, we just Yeah, he's changing it to the So, Mr. Urban, we're we're probably going to Well, we are going to make a contingent on the police and fires approval. Yes. So, you'll meet with them. They'll walk through and tell you what you can and can't do, what you should do, shouldn't do. Sure. Which is, you know, standard.

Yes. Uh, any additional questions, Mr. Tronley? Sorry, just so we have the dates correct. So, it's June 15th through the 19th. Correct. Correct. And then for the times, it says Monday through Thursday 5 to 9. Correct. And then Friday 6 to 11. Correct. Those Okay. So, those are all still correct. Correct. Eliminating the Sunday of 2 to the Sunday and and the Saturday that it was supposed to were eliminating. I'm sorry. Mine says 5 to 11. You just said 5 to 9. Is it 5 to 11? the the last day Monday through Thursday 5 to9 and then Friday 6 to 11. Mine says 5 to 11. Yeah, mine says 5 to 11, too. Oh, mine says 5 to 9. Yes, he's he's got it. Five or 10. It's It's f It's I I'll P8, right? P8. P8. P8. Yeah, I think so. I don't know.

So, I'm going to I I'll tell you. It's 5 to9 Monday through Thursday, 5 to 10 on the Friday the 19th. Okay. Yeah. And it also says six day event, but it's only a five. No, it's we eliminated today event. All right. So, you'll even get some money back. Maybe Sunday 2 to 10. Correct. Correct. So, I'm glad we are that you I'll make a motion we approve the class F beverage license with the amended hours as discussed. I'll make second that motion contingent upon police and fire approval. Thank you, Councilman. All in favor? I Good luck. Thank you. Yeah, just get get in touch with the two chiefs and they'll absolutely you'll be all set.

Thank you, Councilman. Next, we have correspondence C1 through 19. 19. Is there anything in there anyone wants to uh pull for discussion? Okay. Is there a motion to approve correspondence? Motion that we accept and file correspondence. Second. All in favor? Hi. Hi. Can I just make a comment? Yes, you can.

And a uh when we accept and and pass the correspondence, we are just acknowledging that we have seen these and we've read them. It is not uh saying that we agree, disagree, uh vote and approval of them. It just says we have these, we read them, we acknowledge them. Correct. That's that was my intention. Yeah. We just accept and file. But there was no I know you know this but there was something written recently that inferred that we had approved the entire correspondence uh that we are in agreement with it and it's there is a little nuance there that

we may not Yeah we're accepting it we know it's there receiverhip and filing next we have old business discussion and action regarding alt fees and fines Mr. Rego. So, everyone should have got a copy of this new fee and fines. So, basically what we did was we sent it to all the department heads, asked for recommendations. We got some recommendations from them and then we went to the budget committee and um they were good with these recommendations. The only the only thing that's uh different and we'll go we'll talk about it in the last page and that was with the uh we got the email list. What? It's not we don't you don't have a page copy of it. I didn't. No, it was emailed. We didn't get paper copy. You guys don't read your emails?

I did, but I didn't print out a copy. Do you have any empty copies? I have a quick question on this, but it's for the solicitor. May I, Mr. President? Yes, you may. Um, are any of these I don't know if Tony, have you had a chance to look at these? I have. Yes. Do any of them require general assembly approval? No. Okay. It's five pages. Okay. I I read it in the email. I just didn't print it up. Let's see if I have an extra copy. Okay. So, uh do you have it there? Uh no. No. How about uh Harry?

I mean I have this but there there are no amounts attached. If that is to make this easier. Can we just um go back to this and somebody make copies of this? That way they'll have it on. fully can do it for next month. No, I'd like I'd rather do it this month. We could just make some copies. It's not going to take that long. We go for the next We'll move on to new business discussion and action regarding a request uh for recognition of native and indigenous peoples, the hanging of a portrait of Masasoya to the Poconos Sequin. And Miss Flanigan is here. I'm just gonna grab a table so I can keep up.

Okay. which show. What show? Wheel of Fortune. No, I think you're good. I think we're we're rocking and rolling here. I have it.

Yeah. Let it get hard as possible. See if I need to do something. Give me one second because I think visuals are important in this. Will you hear me present? All right, let me try one more time. I didn't like it.

Here we go. Okay. So, um my proposal has to do with that portrait uh behind you there. um that was donated to the town of Warren according to information we found in uh council minutes uh in uh the early 2020s. Um no 2005 2005 right um sorry that's and um maybe 2003 yeah uh by early 2000 by the Ailla family.

Yes. Uh this is Lord Admiral Warren who uh fought a uh important uh pre-revolutionary battle uh in uh I believe it was St. Lawrence Seaway uh as I understand it there were uh citizens from the town of Warren that served on his ship and one of the reasons why the town of Warren is named after him is because of that. Uh we he never came to Rhode Island much less Warren. Um I am proposing if we can get that little screen thing at the bottom to disappear or not.

Uh so I'm proposing that we add to the council chambers a painting of Osami. Uh this is the massesoid of the um uh Poka tribe who um supported the colonists um uh in uh the Massachusetts Bay Colony. uh signed the first treaty in the United States between uh native peoples and colonists. Um uh provided uh support to the colonists uh during uh periods when otherwise they would not have survived um and was generally a friend to uh them uh during that period.

Uh this painting was um uh done by a Martha's Vineyard artist. Uh it is based uh to my understanding on materials that were found on Burus Hill. Uh of what is believed to have been Osamiquin's grave site. Uh items found there were uh a red materials from a red throat, brass buttons, uh bead beaded made of um an animal. Is it coyote or wolf? Wolf pelt. Um, so this what he's wearing is is is believed to have been what he was buried in. Um, and um, his his features are based on uh, present day Poconor Peoples. Um, so it it's as good a representation as we can of someone who lived 400 years ago. Um, this portrait belongs to the War Reservation

Society. Uh they uh purchased it from the artist. Uh it hangs uh on occasion in the George Hill Library in the front room across from the uh uh front desk. It's on the wall right now. Is that right? Or is it here in the wall right now? We have it right now.

Okay. All right. On occasion it does uh hang in a library across the street here. Um I am proposing that a reproduction of this this is a reproduction um of this painting be made to hang alongside Lord Al Admiral Warren. This painting is somewhat smaller. So I would propose it being made somewhat larger so that the size of Osami is the same size as Lord Admiral Warren and that the framing in scale and weight be similar to um the Admiral. I'm proposing something like this. um to to be done. Um I will admit that I have a little bit of a personal interest in this. Um I found out a couple years ago that my ninth great ancestor um ancestors were Mary and William Brewster who were on the Mayflower and um I would not be here today were it not for the support of the Pocona people of the Massachusetts Bay Colony at that time. So

you're going to recuse yourself pretty much. Tony. No. So, um, this is a donation. No cost to the town.

No cost to the town. Um, I we will raise money to to do the, uh, reproduction of the painting. Um, and we want to do reproduction so that there's not a risk to the the original gorgeous painting in this public space that isn't always monitored. Um, for those of you who don't know, there's a we believe to be a uh representation, it's wrong, but a representation of Osami on the front of town hall and the title so which was the geographical area made up from East Providence to uh you know uh East Proidence to Green Providence and the Ton River

rather large area of if if um Louise could come up and add anything else that I had left out or would be of benefit. Mr. Weed are happy to provide any uh historical background and correction of whatever I said wrong.

Well, no, you you got it right. But uh this is an opportunity for the town to recognize the original name of the town was Sooms. Okay. before 1747. So, we're just capturing the history that this town has always had and it's acknowledging the importance of a person who fundamentally changed America. Okay? If it weren't for us and his agreement in 1621 that's on the front of town hall, we wouldn't be here. Okay. U so I think it's particularly fitting that we're talking about doing this 350 years after King Phillip's war which essentially ended uh the the domination of people in this uh territory by native people who had been here for 10,000 years. So, uh, uh, we would provide some information on the wall that would explain what this is, but it would mean that anybody coming to town council would understand what our history truly is.

Are there any questions of Madigan? Mr. Trombly. Oh, all right. Thank you. Um, I have Well, first let me just say this is wonderful. Uh, I I really think this is a wonderful idea to put the history in context. It's it's really important. When I was a young man growing up, I uh always thought that the town was named after the famed patriot Dr. Joseph Warren, who died in at the battle of Bunker Hill. To my chagrin, when I became an adult, I learned the truth, the sad truth. But um Admiral Warren fought against us. He was a loyalist.

He was a a dirty loyalist. Yes. So it's um but he still has the privilege of having the town named after him and having done so much. So uh we do not want to erase that uh legacy and that contribution but it is important as as you know to include the contributions of the native peoples. Um so just to clarify the Warren Historical Society supports this idea war preservation societ preservation society and h the the uh the local tribe has no no issue with this representation at all. They would be honored.

They would be honored. Okay. Excellent. Uh sorry that was my that was my last Mr. Rego. All I want to say is that you talked about this a while back and I had some reservations taking down Sir Warren, but when I saw this and I saw the two pictures side by side, I thought that if you can get them of equal side, it would complement one another and it would show the true history of Warren. So, I kind of like having them both up there like that. Okay. Is there a motion? I will make a motion. Is there any way to make this them the same size? Would that not fit with the wall? Uh the uh Osamiquin poetry is smaller than it appears up there.

This representation I have here has the people themselves the same size. We could have then the frames to be the same size and do matting to so that the weight of the two paintings visually are similar so that there would be matting around the gold part around Osami. I have a new idea for you. So So from a distance they would be weighted similarly and it would not appear as though one person was much larger. Mr. Flanigan, you've led me to believe that the funding isn't a problem, right?

Why don't you resize that one? It's a it's just a picture on canvas. Uh the same company that did it is probably doing what you're asking to be done now. And that way there you wouldn't have to try so hard to augment the other one to fit here and there. as an idea. I think if you're looking for them to be the same size, why not? It's another thousand dollars or $600. I I will take that as a friendly amendment. And um if you want to see the final proposal before we, you know, make the the final print, uh I can come back to the council with what the final proposal.

Three. You like that idea? Both of them the same exact size. I I I like the hair. I would like but before you move forward I would like to see more of it because I'd really hate to see it have changed but well the only thing that would change is because of the space they would be made proportionate so so they would you know fit the space it may be that um this this portrait gets framed smaller so there's less background around it yeah or or you could actually frame white yes all around it where you're not touching the the portrait trick. Well, they could just make this one smaller. It's a picture on canvas. It's a computer.

There are options and I can It's Riverside Art over Somerset who um said we could do this for us. I can ask them to join me here sometime. And make the two fit the sign. I'll make the motion. I make a motion that you make the two pictures to fit the space behind us of equal proportion. Is there a second? I'll second that. And I'll say I'll leave the artistic up to the artists, but if you can come back and give us sort of an approximation. Ultimately, I think it's just a concern. We want to make sure that we're representing each equally. Yeah. So that we don't in inadvertently send a bad message so it looks tasteful behind. Exactly. Discussion. Discussion.

I'm okay with it and I trust your judgment that you wouldn't, you know, hack the heck out of. So yeah, just this is me photoshopping something in about 10 minutes. Okay, Miss Cronin has a question. The original portrait of Osamiquin, the size of it, uh, it's about Oh, I do have that 32 by 40 something. So, it's significantly smaller. 30 by 40 roughly. Okay. So, the notion of enlarging it, it's it's about that size. Okay. So, the the artist who did this still with us? No, she passed away.

No, no, no. The artist is lives on Martha's Vineyard. She's very much in touch with the Pocona tribe. She's done several other paintings for them. Um, second one we purchased of of the S's village up at Margaret's Cave and things of that sort. She would be happy to have this here and uh and she would be okay with us adjusting the size of it. Yeah. Computer rendition. The original will will be remain at George Hale Library. Right. Right. Right. But she with us. I don't can't imagine her scale of it. I I mean I don't know for sure. I asked you this, but it seems to me that because you own the rights to it,

right, and reproduce it as we're reproducing it leaving the aesthetics and proportion to you can and the frame would be another consideration. You could you could not change the other one and make this one smaller. I'm giving you the latitude to make this look like something proper that we're trying to correct. The goal be to have the two paintings equal size to fit behind here. Equal size and weight if we're perhaps in similar frames.

And if we're discussing size, I'd prefer this one to be much smaller. Just that's my that would be my preference. Well, listen, let me just say here. I was here 20 something years ago when they presented. I remember Leon sent sitting here. Not a respect for him and his family who did a lot contributed a lot to this town. I'm okay with a little bit but not considerably a lot more. Okay. Okay. So, just so you know, again, my motion is to make the two portraits proportionately sized to fit the space behind us. Yep. Second to have it next. All in favor? I I Okay. Now, thank you very much. Thank you. You're welcome.

Thank you. Next, we have new business. Did you get Was there an extra cop? No, you just gave two sheets. I thought those were them. No, it's a whole pack like I got mine on the computer. So, there you go. That's what I have right here. You got it now. Yep. But he's missing. You're missing the two front page. There you go. You have to go back to them. Are we going back to this jump? Yes. Okay, good. Yeah. So, that's just the front page. So, you already got that. So, those are extras. Yeah. Not an old Okay. Yes. Mr. Rego, we're going to the uh you know, now I'm missing two

back to OB. That's the craziest thing. I just had this in front of me, too. So, all right. So, we're reviewing the fees and fines. Yes. And um so basically we sent this to the uh department heads. Uh they came up with some recommendations. I brought it to budget committee and they approved those recommendations and it's up to us to decide whether you want to move on them or not. So the first one in front of you would be the finance department which there was no changes. Okay. Okay. Actually got two finance departments. the second one. And you know what? M mine's out of order right now.

Beach parking is the second one on ours. Which one is it? Beach parking. Oh, this is really screwed up. All right. So, beach parking. So, uh again, this went to the recreation department and if you look to the right, the recommendation or what they charge you know on the left you see fee charge. Right now they charge five. They're recommending $10. Uh I'll read all of these if anybody has any questions or we 20 for the non-resident. We can vote on in one shot. Okay. Okay.

Non-residents uh they charge 10. Now they're recommending 20. Uh residential weekend fee $10. They're recommending 15. Non-residential weekend the $20. Now they're recommending 30. Summer camp. They're going for residents 300 to 350. Uh additional child 150 to 200. Non-residents 500 to 600. Does anybody have any questions on this? Um Misso, Mr. Rego's discussed all of these with you. These all have your approval. Well, they were

come to the microphone. Yeah, I think we already we already approved the increase in the I want to make sure. I mean, they impact her her families and her her program. So, well, everything was already approved in December. Yeah. And everything's actually online already with moving forward on all. Okay. So, basically, these went to her and she put in the recommendations and I'm just voting on I that we vote on. We're just making it consistent. Consistent. That's all. Okay. But they're all already approved. They're already in place. Thank you. Okay, Mr. will continue. So I make a motion that we uh go with these changes. I'll second it. All in favor? Is there discussion? All in favor? I Okay.

So the next one is the Harbor Commission. And again, I apologize. I had mine stuck here. I don't know what happened. So the hybrid commission uh private residential moings would be going from 175 to 200. Each additional foot would be going from $5 to $8. Private non-resident moorings would be going from 275 25 ft and under 325. $5 each additional foot go from $5 to $8. Commercial moorings would go from 350 to 400. Boring application fees would be going from 25 to $40. Waiting list fee 10 to 25. Town dock fees per foot would go from 75 to 90. Commercial docks 300 to 400. I think that one we already did by ordinance, right, Joe? Um, and all state will vote fines they stay at 100. That I think that's by uh by this state. So we can't change that. So

So Mr. Silva, have you had a chance to review all of these? Please come to the microphone. I did an original proposal of the fees and it got changed somewhere along the line. Are these in accordance with your wishes? Did you have a chance to look at these? So, I don't have a copy of it. There's a one. Well, I don't know who changed. So, Mr. So I didn't change these. These were given to Brian and then Brian gave them to me. These were department head recommendations. So these are all the original proposals. Yes. This is

then didn't we already approve all of these when we we didn't? No. I think the only thing we approved was the commercial duck that Joe came in front of us from $300 to $400. Right. Yeah. Yeah, this is I had proposed this is the first reading. We're not doing the second reading. I I had proposed a little less on most of them. Somebody just bumped it up a little. I had proposed 80

per foot. Somebody took it to 90 from 75. Um I'm not against any of it. I just thought, you know, looking at where we are compared to other towns in the area and that wouldn't go in effect till next year anyway because we already got we've already tracks. The intent is that we do gradual things so we don't have to do big bumps and look at these things on an annual basis. Now, one of the things that we're going to try to do and I'm going to try to do is to try to monitor more on a monthly basis our revenue, how many units we have, and that'll help us make determinations whether these things are worth moving or not. We don't have that. So, right now, all we have is what's in front of us.

Well, are you comfortable with those numbers in front of you, Joe? I am. I think the um weightless renewal fee being at 25 bucks is kind of high. Okay. you're just renewing a position on a wait list. Um, and the morning application fee. Well, I think maybe the intent there is bumping all the way to maybe the intent there is to weed out the people who are just keeping it there. Never had any fee. Well, now re or even reapplication, right? So now I think the intent is the people who are on there have a vested I would all for IO I had proposed $10. Okay. So I think Mr. Rego is trying to get it up to a a higher level.

So So let me just say this, Ryan. You got this from Joe, right? Yes. I I believe we worked on it together that I could have put the wrong numbers in some. Okay. So basically these recommendations came from the department and it's possible. Yeah. I I don't have any and again we're here for discussion. Is there I have no objection to any of those amounts. Okay. So it's just different from what I had originally brought in. knock the waiting list fee back to 10 bucks because that is a 25 bucks just to have your name on a list, right? That you have to So if a person got on the list five years ago, they paid $10 five years ago to be on the waiting list or is the waiting list No, I don't think he's ever charged to get on the waiting list.

Okay. So the waiting list fee is a new fee. The wait list now will be a new fee. Okay. So, so seeing as we've never had this fee before, I don't think it makes sense to bump it up to $25. I am very confused right now. How there was supposed to be a fee paid to get on weight. I don't know that anybody ever paid Well, that's a different story. But there was there was a price list for a waiting fee, right? Because yes, this is and no one ever paid it. That's another story. Never did the annual. So, you never charged it reup of the weight list. Although I'm in my wood getting my feet on the ground.

So once again I'm gonna say this is a first reading Mr. Dysto correct. That's correct. Yes. So there will be a second reading next month. Any changes that after you look at this and it settles in you can come back to us if you need. So uh do you think 25 is too high for just to be on a waiting list? Yeah. I think well let's participate fine. And I guess I guess the argument is we have a hell of a wedding waiting list and I don't know if that makes what we don't know is how real it is because it's really the application.

So I think what Mr. Rego is trying to figure out is how real it is based on people who are willing to put $25 down which is then refundable towards the redeemable towards the That's not what it says here. So if somebody gets the mooring, isn't the $25 a step? No, it's $10 every year to be on the list. All right. It should be redeemable towards the mooring fee once if you pay the $25 to wait and you call you up and they say you got a a moing. I see I see the $10 renewal fee is him keeping it up to date in the system. Mr. President, may I ask a question? Yes, you can. It seems to me that I'm sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead.

It seems to me that there's two questions here. One, what should the fee be? And two, is it an annual fee or a one-time fee to be on the waiting list? Good point. If it's a onetime fee, I would be comfortable being $25. If it's an annual fee, then I think we should keep it at 10 and have it be start being collected. What would you like to say, Mr. S? I was just about to say my mistake was to get on the list. It's a $25 fee that I charge. This year, we've been charging $25 to get on the list for the first time. The annual fee $10 has never been we have never re re-uped the list. Okay. We don't do a reapplication annually,

but the new system that we're going to put in place will be doing that. Okay. So, we just got to decide on a fee. So, Joe, again, I got this information from you, right? No, my mistake. So, I guess the confusion is there is a fee that the first time you want to get on the list, you pay $25. 25 and then annually you'll pay $10 to be on that list or you that's what we had proposed just stay on because I think the list is not accurate. Yeah. Is it a long list Joe for the moorings or um all told a couple hundred I think between all the different moing fields. Yeah.

But I tried to get two dock slips last year um were open. I went through 15 people before I got a taker. sold my vote, aged out of voting, moved out of town. All right. Good information, Mr. Radio. Continue on. Okay. So, you want to keep So, you want to keep the uh Now that this explained, I think it should be 25 to get on and then 10 annually.

All right. So, we don't have a a line a line here to get on and one for renewing. Uh so, let's change that $25. If you go down the waiting list, renewal fee, let's change that to $10. And then let's put a uh a waiting list fee at the bottom in here. And let's make it $25. How's that? That sound good? So we got private res. Yes. Right. I'll make a motion to that effect. All right. So the private residential morings we're going for. Did I read all of this already? Yeah. I just have It says uh all state voting fines. You're good with $100 each or are we? I think that's set by the state. Oh, that's set by the state.

So, I read them all. So, do we have a motion to approve? Mr. Tromley just did. Okay. Is there a second? I'll second. All in favor? Thank you. Okay. Good work. No, we're not done yet. We're not. No, we have the animal control officer. We got the police department. He's got nothing else to do all week. So, for animal control officer, sewer is the next page. You're in the wrong order. There was nothing to be changed in the sewer, so we'll leave it alone. Uh, so for animal control officer, uh, impounding dogs going from $10 a day to $25. Uh, no, this is athletic fields.

Are you on the animal control officer? No, go ahead. Don't stop for me. And then, uh, second offense, $5 to $10. Unlicensed dog. First offense is 25. That's going up to 50. Unlicicensed dog second offense gone from 100 to there was no change in that one. Uh vicious dog right now they ch charge $10. That fees going to $20 per day or just I just have vicious dog. I don't understand. I don't know if it's per day or not, but right now they charge a fine of $10. Roy, you want to you understand how this works?

The vicious dog. Okay. So, right now they charge a fee of $10. They're recommending, and I'm assuming this came from the animal control officer, correct? Yes. Uh they gone from 10 to 20. Uh vicious dog harms another domestic animal from 10 to 15. Vicious dog bites a human, it's going from $20 each year to $30. Dog waste non removal. That's staying the same. I'll make a motion to approve. Go ahead. Discussion. Sure. What is dog waste not removal? Non removal. Does that mean when somebody if you catch somebody pick up? So 25 bucks if is that what it's been should be 50. I'll make a motion to

collect increase it to 50 then. Yeah. Pick up your dog poop I guess. I don't know. Okay. How many dog removal fines have we re covered in the past 10 years? Probably none, I'll bet. Probably zero. All right. Uh there's a motion to increase it to 50. There's a second. All in favor? I won't. Um, all right. So, Mr. Deisto, are there any state laws that supersede these? No. Go ahead, Mr. And by the way, if I may, it's always been my position that when you come to matters of this nature. It's purely a local concern. You can set the fees like you want, just like, for instance, what uh council vice president Cronin just did. You want up it, you can. Yeah.

The first bite's free, right? No, I thought the first bite was free. No, I was going to say the first bite cost you 20 bucks, Joe. Oh, it says Let me just say this. This dog bites a human. 20 bucks. We're going up. We're going up to 30. The first bite ain't free anymore. All right. Let me just say this because of what Carrie just brought up because I have signs in a couple of my houses where no pee, no poop, but it's going to be my signs are going to be changed as $50 if they do. And I mean it's a good reminder for people. You could be out there with We pick up other poof all the time. It's horrible. All right, the next Carrie does. I don't Yeah, excuse me all.

Okay, so the next one is for the police department. Wait a minute. We voted on the one. Is there a motion to approve all of these? Motion. Is there a second? Second. All in favor? Police. Police. So the police department is three. The third thing that's on there, the police uh detail cruiser fees, that is by policy. We don't have anything to do with that. Uh Roy, the chief has changed them from $30 to $40 an hour. Um parking violations, uh we're looking we're gone from 20 to 50 for all of them. No, just parking violations, but all the different kinds of parking violations. What? Well, the chief will have to, you know, respond to that. I don't know the difference.

Parking on the curb, parking too close to the corner, parking. So, so we there are different. So, let's just talk about these two and then we'll talk about the other ones. So, parking violations. The recommendation was to go from 20 to 50. Does anybody have a problem with that? No. No. I just had a question. Chief, how often do we give out parking violations? Is that I've not seen a lot. Yeah. The summertime is a good amount. Hundreds. So, I think I asked that question when I was in your office, chief. Okay, chief. I think I asked that question. I think he came up with like 865 if that was the number.

And actually, we we get we have to buy those tickets. So, we keep track of that. And it makes it so there's actually a reason not to just park in an illegal spot and $20 for parking. So, 50 makes it really uh hit you prohibitive, expensive. Yeah, I Okay, I support that. But the snowb violations, I I think 70s and five is a little high. I would only like to see 50 because people have extenduating circumstances. I would like to see 150 on those, especially after these past winter. Yeah. They just stay there. They don't really care.

Yeah. You know that we we really don't want to collect anything, but we want the message to get to people because right now, like even the $20, it's cheaper to pay the $20 parking ticket than just go look for parking. In the snow, it's really important that people move their cars during snow and if they have a hardship, they can call the station prior to getting the the car towed. So, I like the 75 bucks. All right. So, the rest you asked about the other uh um fines, disabled parking u violation. Right now, it's $100. That didn't change. 175 second. Yeah, let's not go over the ones that didn't change. Let's make a motion for the changes. Is there a motion? Make a motion we approve the changes. Is there a second? All in favor? I.

Thank you. Next. Okay. So, on the last one, the transfer station, we uh Mary and I spoke, we even had John Massid. Um she we we did have a suggestion, but Mary has changed it, and that was on the stickers. Uh we, you know, we wanted to do something for the community, but I think Mary, at this point, we're going to leave it alone. Correct. So, the commercial permit will go from $40 to 50 or is that no? It's Yes. Is there a motion to approve the commercial permit increase to $50? So, we're not given the 500 pounds. No, we can't afford it. No. Is there a second? Second. All in favor? Thank you, Mr. Dgo, for that work.

Next, we have NB.

Joe, just before we go on, so Tony, you're going to be putting together the audience and you're going to be putting it all in this format here, right? Did you want to discuss that? So, uh, there's two things. If you take a look in the code book, you've got these sprinkles all through the the code book. One of the suggestions that Mr. Rigo had was to um have a a separate ordinance which lists all the fees and fines you can have in both places. Many cities and towns have that. So, if somebody wants to know what a fine is or fee or whatever, they can go right to the ordinance. I suggest it goes in 2.2. It's an existing ordinance. It already has some uh of the fees for the town, but you can make it for fees and fines, too.

It be an index list it right there. Pretty much an index. Okay. Good. Make a motion we direct the solicitor to draft an ordinance covering the town of Warren's fees as discussed. This schedule be incorporated into that using that format. Second. All in favor? Thank you. Next. New business due. discussion in action regarding the addition of a stop sign uh or signs on Water Street as a measure to calm traffic and speeding. Miss Cronin.

Well, I'm pretty sure that uh most law enforcement and safety people would say that stop signs should not be used to calm traffic and speeding, but I think on Water Street, given the narrow uh uh nature of the street and the parking on one side and the number of accidents we're seeing, uh two weeks ago, there were two accidents right in front of my store. One almost killed this guy. Didn't didn't work. He survived. The next one, a transport van was coming down, hit a pickup, ripped the axle, blew out the tire, skidded to a stop. I mean, it's just insane the way people are driving on Water Street. And if we could get another stop sign or two um placed, maybe it would help and maybe people would be a little more mindful of the way that they're driving. It doesn't help with the big huge delivery trucks. I believe we have language ordinance about time of day for deliveries. Aren't they supposed to be in the early morning? They're not. They're all times of day and night. you see these trucks that are that take up the entire street. It's just it's it's getting it's getting pretty crazy down there on Water Street. So, um I don't know if this is a discussion to be had this evening, if this is a refer to the traffic commission to think about some creative ways of of calming the traffic and creating a more safe environment. But it's it's really dangerous and it's it's uh yeah, it's it's it's a problem and it's it's it's getting worse. And then and then the other day, I mean, Toyota SUV

versus Porsche. I mean, literally an oopsy left turn, the a car drove up right over somebody's uh 911. It was Carrie. I I I agree with Carrie, but I I think we should send it to the tracks. And I'm not a big fan of more stop signs, but there must be an answer.

Well, one of the one I spend a lot of time, as you know, sitting in my front yard and the acceleration point from Miller to the light is pretty dramatic. and people coming southbound who either think the stop sign's going to disappear or they have no intention of of slowing down while they get there. There's this really dramatic decrease in speed. uh that's where the majority of these accidents are happening uh in our from Miller to uh so one of the recommendations I was thinking and the car is trying to pull out of 99 water or whatever the address of uh the entrance to the apartments at the American tourist to me seems to be a logical spot when you break down that distance. It can't be done for traffic. I I'm looking at it as being done for people turning in and out. I mean, not for speed control, but for people trying to turn in and out of that area. So, I don't disagree with Mr. Rego. Uh, I'd love to to have input from the traffic commission. I think that the rest of the street is just the narrowness and it's not so much speed from Miller Street on. The speed really is that beginning approach or the exiting.

Yeah. I I don't So, Mr. Rego, yeah, I gotta be honest with I I would prefer a speed bump than a stop sign. Me, too. And I'm going to tell you why. Because once you get used to driving these streets and you put up a stop sign, it's like, "Oops, I forgot about," you know, about a speed bump, you you tend to slow down. I have no problem with speed dumps. I think that we should apply for a grant and we should put speed humps all over the place. Uh they make you slow down. So, uh we'll send that to the traffic commission. Make a motion we refer this to the traffic commission for our next monthly meeting. I I'm looking Brian Brian's thinking speed cameras. Speak cameras.

No, I don't like speed cameras. Um yeah, I I'll I'll agree with that wholeheartedly. I was just curious if that suggestion about speed humps, would we want them just on Water Street or some of the side streets as as well because we have Well, they cost a lot of money. Yeah. Well, if they're going to look into it though and make a suggestion, is it just for Water Street or could it be for Right now, we're looking at the Water Street. All right, fine. No worries. And there's a second. All in favor? Thank you. Next, we have the town manager. He's looking for a discussion and action regarding a request from Mr. Saviano for the Rhode Island State Traffic Commission to conduct a study on the installation of a traffic light at the intersection of Market Street and Schoolhouse Road.

Thank you, Mr. President, members of the council, um um Mr. Saviano reached out to me. Um he was referred to me by um uh Senator uh Felag uh to request that we submit a letter to the uh state traffic commission to have a study conducted on the uh ability or the necessary of putting a uh traffic light at the intersection of uh schoolhouse road. Are there any questions on the uh I just have a quick question. Go right ahead. Have we had a study done on that road? No, not at not at that intersection. Yeah, that's pretty tough intersection.

It can be. And we've had a death dam. I I have no problem with that. And and there's no cost to the town for this. This is would be entirely paid for by the DOT. Well, it's what it's Yeah. They study it. Yeah. The state. Yeah. We don't pay nothing. We're asking them to. Uh so there's a motion. Is there a second? Second. Uh so we're going to send a request to all in favor. I

thank you. Next we have discussion and action of pos possible authorization the town manager to sign the grant special conditions as required by the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency in connection with the hazard mitigation grant program. And it's the award to the town of Warren with a total approved project cost of 30,000 including a federal share of $22,499 and they gave us 90.

Thanks Mr. President. So this would uh every uh five years I believe it is we have to update our hazardous mitigation plan. We do this through Rhode Island EMA. There is a grant that's associated with a federal grant uh which was just um reinstated. it had been suspended for a little while. Uh they would give us the the 22,000 and we would have to make up the rest of it in kind. Um this has happened in in the past. Uh the uh EMA director uh Chief Souza has done this in the past, but we just need to sign the grant conditions in order to move this forward. Is there a motion for approval? Is there a second? All in favor? I.

Thank you. Next, we have discussion and action regarding budget overages in the following departments. The finance department, they're requesting permission to overspend an outside service account 01520002940 for $28,000. And this is to be offset by the payroll processing and services account 01520002165 or 5750. Mr. President, this

uh this is a request. This is the uh request to zero out these accounts. These accounts um are in the negative at this time. We had last month moved money from the opera money for uh revenue. So the these accounts we would ask that uh we'd use that money to zero out these accounts. Oh yeah, I read it wrong. Anthony, could I there's a bunch of them here. Could we just make one motion to approve these all as presented? That's correct. Yes, you have a question before we do that. Go ahead.

Um on the printed agenda here, it is the first is a request to overspend by 28,000, but in my uh document here, the backup that same account is asking for 18,000. So, which is different? What Brian? I think you're on a different page than us. We have two different amounts. We've got a bunch of requests to overspend, payroll processing, outside services, fire department, stol Yeah, that's a typo. Is it a typo? I don't see anything about offer here. So, it's 18, not 28. Okay.

Okay. But still, he's requesting Oh, I see it. I'm requesting that we use the reallocated opera funds that has been added to revenue for fiscal year 29 budget as follows. So you're actually asking for that amount of opera money to go to those accounts. Okay. All right. So we're going to use the opera plan to cover the over. So I have a question for Mr. Desist though. Do you think the language on the agenda is is proper in regards to describing what we're doing? Yes. Okay. So, can we have discussion on that? So, discussion because I I don't think it is. Why?

Because we're not overspending. We're bringing it to zero. So, how is it that we're over spend? We're not overspending those accounts. They've already been overspent. We're actually bringing them back to zero. Understand you're bringing them back to zero, but just confirming the overspending and we're using the opera money. Correct. Yes. So, which brings me to the second question. Now that we're bringing it back to zero, now we have to overspend in order to to to uh No, the overspending is what the amount is and the opera money brings us to zero. The opera money will bring us to zero. But then then the budget ends July.

Yeah, but but they still need they got two more months they have to operate on. And if they got zero on those lines, how are they going to operate? Right now, they're in a negative. We might need to come back or another. Yes. I And I do have under the finance director, I do have some um um information from the department heads that outline it owns that may go over budget. Okay. The wording confuses me, but if you're okay with it, I'm okay with it. Okay. And Mr. Dysto, you say we can just pass these all as one, correct? Yes. Mr. Hanley already made the motion. Is there a second?

Second. All in favor? Okay. Next we have presentation and discussion regarding projected debt service for the Bristol Warren Regional School District for fiscal year 2028.

Yes, Mr. President, you have in your packet a um uh projection by the school department on what the debt service is going to be for fiscal 28 and beyond. uh and the share that Warren will be required to uh contribute uh Warren's share of the uh debt service is going to be for a total is going to be 1,384,338. Um currently we are paying uh 230,219. So, we will have an increase of uh $1,154,119 for fiscal year 28.

How many years have we bonded out? 30 30 30 years. And then there is a second page that uh that I believe is in your packet that uh shows the projection of what the uh total debt services will be for each year go uh starting uh in 28 and and going to um 2027 uh 207. And each year it is uh total debt service is uh 3,600 uh and thousand or there of soil more or less. That's assuming they don't go out for other stuff borrowing. Correct.

Um you know I I went and I did a little homework and in 2023 they came in front of you here at the council meeting and I was looking at the numbers. At the time they were buying a lot more but the interest rate was lower but these are more or less the numbers that they had said that they were going to be spending you know and it passed by the by the voters.

So Mr. Uh Sullivan, do you think it would be good uh if there is a uh request from the public or a um should we have uh meetings public meetings between now and uh I don't know. Uh do do you think we should have a public No. What what discussion I see this and and it's concerning, but what helps me be able to grasp it is the $1 million we've been paying a year for the settlement is not going to be paid next year, which though it's it's still going to be

that money was borrowed. So borrowed Mr. But what I'm saying is it's in the budget, so it's not going to increase the budget much. May I please?

We're going to take the million out. Put the million. So, when we're talking about the borrowed money, the million dollar was part of a $3 million bridge bond, which is costing us $554,000 a year for the next six years. So, we all unfortunately made a bit of a mistake in our understanding when it was described to us as going from one line item to another. it's actually going to happen is in six years the $544,000 debt service to the bond will be gone. So that would be the first relief that the town sees. what uh what we were in was a bind and when we borrowed the money we basically got charged over $2.5 million to borrow three that action and that ship has sailed. The cost of the town each year on that debt service which is covered by tax revenue was $555,000. The million wasn't actually covered by tax revenue.

So let me just explain. It's a line item in the budget. It was the line item supplied by the bridge bond, not tax revenue. The $550,000 a year to pay back is supported by revenue. So at one point in time, you probably heard that you're going to be paying a million and eventually when those $3 million all done that would go towards a school. But that was before you borrowed the funds. Once you borrow your funds, you put yourself in another Well, we had to borrow the funds. We didn't have correct. I mean, there is one debt service that that's going to be retiring this year. That that'll be 354,000. Um, so there are some things we can do, but we can't do miracles. It is what it is.

So, the tax increase is going to be rather large. The uh next council is going to have to deal with this. They're going to uh along with the manager and all of our staff are going to have to come up with a budget that represents those numbers. and uh we will probably be looking at going to the auditor general for permission and there will be a big uh financial adjustment to the town of Warren. That being said, it's based on the voters's approval of a new school. Our hardship with the lawsuit, it's almost a different story because we are covering that by revenue. That being said, if the public feels the need for a an additional uh public meeting on this issue, I have no problem attending a forum if uh you feel the need, the town feels the need. Other than that, I don't really know what else to do other than as of July 1st, the budget we've created and formalized tonight represents a what 3 point uh

I think it was seven 3.7% increase which uh equates to $11.70 per thousand 11 94 114 per thousand. So that budget has been approved. We're okay now. Um the uh discussion and action is for a later date and a different council. So next we have recognition of the wastewater treatment facility for receiving the gold award for from the Rhode Island Clean Water Association for zero permit violations during the calendar year.

Yes. Uh Mr. President, I just wanted to bring to your attention again this year, uh the uh Warren Wastewater treatment facility received that award. Um and it's a a testament to the the staff that we have working down there. They they work diligently uh to make sure that uh we don't have issues like they had in East Providence last week. Yeah. And we have the new upgrades and Mr. Kamig is meeting with uh so we'll be working on all of those uh the grants and the updates that we need down there. The Yes, that's all moving forward. I think it's a direct reflection on the commissioner down there. You've learned a lot, haven't you? Mr. Kamiga, good work. Good job, Mr. Sullivan. Good work.

Next, we have an update on excess liability insurance. So it seems like you could uh get a $5 million additional which would be 25,000 a year and uh more than that would be 160,000 or 159,000. I do we really feel that this is uh what we want for the town. I think we should just leave what we have.

Okay. I I I ask that this item be investigated for the budget process because we did end up in a situation where we did get a once we think it's a one ina- million lawsuit that really put the town in a very weak financial position. I don't know. I think we have the $5 million coverage from the trust. Derek, could I important I say something though. I know, but let Mr. speak. He's he has the floor. Forgive me for saying this. No, he has the flaw. Would you give me a minute, Derek? Honestly, let me finish, my friend. I would rather you let me say what I have to say.

Gentlemen, as the president of the council, Mr. Tromaly has the floor. I think I know what Mr. Rio is going to say. I'll let him say it in a minute. But what I'm saying is that for 20 how how long would this um quote be val is that included in this? May I make a suggestion? Yes.

I think it would be uh very helpful here if uh Mr. TR you met with the trust u with I I I don't mind going but definitely with the manager so they can go over some of the particulars of uh this whole this whole proposal. Yeah, I just I mean I think this is something we definitely should should study a little bit further. Um and uh yeah that's I'll end it there. What I'd like to do is recommend it, you know, u speaking to the trust. And of course, you can't go as a a whole team. Uh but uh uh you know, they they um the trust is a is a member insurance uh pool. Yeah.

And I I I I recommend that you go and and you go and speak to them. They they'd like to talk to you. And there's some uh details I think that would take too long for this meeting, but I do think you should hear. Yeah, I'm in favor of shortening the meeting as as much as possible. So, I'll I'll defer and discuss with the town man town manager. Mr. Fam, exactly what Tony said. I was going to say the exact same words. Okay. Next. The solicitor request a motion for executive session pursuant to Rhode Island general law 42465 subsection A1 personnel. This is the police chief's contract. Make a motion for executive session. Is there a second? Second, Mr. Tromley I Miss Cronin I Mr. Hanley

I Mr. Reagan I I next we have discussion and action on items discussed in executive session and that will take place afterwards pardon me for even re reading it finance director revenues and expenditures have them all here everyone there any questions you have of Mr. uh Masha. Okay. Next we have discussion on report from department heads regarding line items that may go over in the budget. You don't have Mr. President. I have I have correct.

Thank you. So are are are these any of the opera lines?

These are not these these are the projected uh we reached out to the department heads to they have not gone over they are not in the red yet but they are projected to be in the red u and so we wanted to bring that to your attention. Uh, I will meet with the finance director and we will look at uh other other uh sources of revenue that we might be able to move money from one uh line item to the next to cover these uh projected expenses. The byproduct of

the shared services in the buildings that's mostly energy related increases. uh energy related. Uh Mary V Cork, we had a uh um tank that uh exploded down there that needed to be repaired. That was part of the heating system. Um but uh town hall, government center, um those are heating. I mean, those are energy related. Uh town hall, we have a a leak in the heating system that needs to be repaired as well. Uh now and the computer expenses, how did that go over?

Uh if you recall back in uh November, I had mentioned that the uh computer uh contract had expired and the new one required an increase in uh monthly fees which we were not aware of in July or June when we put the budget together last year. Uh so that that's the uh the cause of that. Yeah. Yes, Mr. Reagan. So these are the these are figures projected. These are projected they're going to need to to finish the year. Yes.

So my only question is and this is the right thing to do. You're supposed to let us know. Um you're just going to let us know next month what lines it going to come out of. I I have a question. Does it always have to come out of a line or can it come out right out of the general fund? Ultimately, that's what happens if if we don't have a line to do it. Yeah. Yeah. So, if you overspend the budget, you could do that then. Well, I would say if you if we couldn't find someplace to get the money from, I would just say let it run over. It's what when the budget's done, right? Automatically. It's why we zero out so that at the end of the year, we know what is coming out of the general fund.

Because the problem when you stop moving money around is from a budgeting perspective, it's hard to keep track. where if you just took it out of the general fund, it'd be easier. But yeah. Well, yeah, but you want to you want to identify try to balance that fiscal year. Yeah. But so but it's so that next year you know how much that department needed and how much those lines needed. These overages I'm looking at as we sharpened our pencil too tight too finely last year. We put in unrealistic numbers in hopes that we would meet these uh the winter storms or our the tasks that we set for the uh financial expense associated with those tasks.

Yeah. Yeah. To be honest with you, I don't think they're too bad these numbers. I think they're we'll know better when that's probably at the end of the budget because you don't want to start taking from another line that then that's going to go over. Yeah. So, you're gonna have to work on this for next month and that's what you're talking I I think it's it's I think you're going to come out with post a balanced budget by the end of this. So, do I do we need a motion to approve these overages or wait until they submit? No. Yeah, we're not the This is Mr. Rego. This is projected. Okay.

As we always do, but Mr. Rego has made a very good point of pushing it forward that before anything goes over, he wants to see it. He's seeing it. We're seeing it. But we're also hearing that there are lines that are going to offset these. We hope and we're pretty solid in that feeling as well. Next we have uh discussion and action uh I'm sorry cash balance cash balance report. Thank you.

Okay. Yeah. So our cash balances we're a little flossed right now because we just went through a recession cycle. Um, and I'd say we we've got enough cash on hand to get us through through um through to the beginning of July. Good. And then at the end of July, we'll start collecting till August. So yeah, we're in good shape. All right. We're on a slow increase, thank God. Next we have discussion and action regarding investment strategy that the town should consider for the funds held in the Rhode Island interlocal OPED trust fund. Okay.

So currently uh Mr. President we have about 1.3 million in in the trust fund at the interlocal trust. as such a play on words, but they they they managed for us. Um when this fund was when we first invested into this fund, um our investment was in the conservative area. Um it's the uh finance director's uh recommendation that we uh change that to the growth area um so that we can uh gain some a little bit more interest from our investments.

Is it risky? There's Yeah. Well, there is a little bit more risk. Um that's the Mr. The intent of these investments are long-term. So from that perspective, we're better off then when there is risk uh you know while yeah it drops quicker but it also goes up quicker so it's one of those things comfortable with this yeah and then we went the whole budget committee was better off and the budget committee felt comfortable with this we have a member yes uh okay so uh is there a motion needed yes so uh we need a motion to

I'll make a motion that we move it over to the growth fund Second. All in favor? I. Next, we have discussion and action regarding a resolution in support of House 2026 H7369 mandatory other postemployment benefits uh funding levels. This is from Councilman Tromley.

It's not quite from Councilman Tromblley. This was on the agenda last meeting and the resolution was to oppose 7369 because of some of the implications in the legislative language that I had read and based on where our uh OPED uh finances were at the time and still are. Uh I still have concerns about this legislation. My understanding is that those some of this bill is being amended, worked on at the state house. Um I have basically um to go back to the beginning on this, we pay uh for other post-employment benefits, oped on a pay as you go basis. So when someone retires, we pay out of our general uh expenses, out of our budget. We do however have a trust set aside and in that trust is about $230,000 and part of OPEB.

No, that's the million3 we just million three. Million3. Yeah. Yeah. The the 230 it may be what we pay out on a an annual basis. Yeah, that sounds the 230 is probably what our annual contribution is as you pay and go. And you're correct. I'm sorry I misspoke because they this was from last month. So you introduced a resolution in opposition to House bill. So thank you for the correction. No, it's quite all right. Um and we voted to to reject and and we voted we voted to we voted in support of that in support of opposing legislation. Correct. My understanding is that the since then the manager and the finance director have had a conversation with the auditor general and the bill is being amended and worked on. Correct.

But I just wanted to go back to the beginning because this is something I've been passionate about since I got on the council. I've talked to the budget committee about it. I've talked to the finance director about it. Now that the budget cycle for us is concluding, this was to be the basically I believe if and correct me if I'm wrong, Gary, but this was going to be your top priority going into the fall trying to develop a plan to fully fund our OPED to the ADC level. And the difference between payo and ADC is the payo is just we pay as we go. We pay as needed. ADC is called the actuarily determined contribution level. It's what the accountants say we should be putting in in order for the interest to pay off all of our expenses related to people's retirement postemployment benefits. That's where a lot of wealthier towns do. Bington does it. Jamestown does it. A lot of the wealthier communities do it. Some of the not so wealthy communities like us, Situit don't do that. This bill 7369 makes us go to that. And some of the language in it is a little bit troubling to me when I read it and that's why I brought it to the council about the the finance director having to produce a plan to the auditor general on a on a regular basis on annual basis if we're not funding to the agency level and then it seems to imply that that plan is subject to auditor general approval. So the auditor general can say we don't approve that plan. We have to make changes and then it takes away local control and puts state in control of our local finances. Um at least to some degree. So I had a little bit of an issue with that. So I brought it before it. Um but I'll I'll defer to the manager and the final. So the auditor general's explanation of it was more so that he can at least have the discussions with the towns about where they're going more than forcing us to

get to the plan. They just want to make sure like we are looking at it and we're discussing. I mean he his his um take on it was that there's no teeth in it. Okay. And I understand that that might not have been the intent. It's just how I read the bill and I know it's being worked on to amend it, but do correct me if I'm wrong. Currently, in order to reach that ADC level, that magic level, we would have to increase our contributions about $450,000. Um, I'm not sure on that. I'd have to look at the Okay. I'm sorry, Derek. What is that level? Do you know? Uh, sure. Can you give me one second? Sure.

Yeah, because that's very Let me say this. Um, I I I read the legislation like four times and I gotta be honest with you, I got an idea of what it, but I shouldn't have to read something four times to figure it out. Very confusing, very complicated. I learned a lot. We have to have a plan in place and I think we're going to put it's very easy. Uh, you know, right now we're probably paying $230,000 x amount of employees. Remember that when another employee comes on, another one dropped. So, we just got to keep track of it. We should have a plan in everything that this legislation says. Common sense we should be doing anyways. You don't need a law to do these things. Too many laws on the books. I'm against it.

Sorry. So, can I just inform the council,

please? So, this is what I This is based on the query. This is what it was said. The amount uh in Warren's case, the town's OPED plan, they currently fund a payo, even though they have a trust already created. That amount was I assume the amount of OPED for fiscal year 24 was 237,121 to fund at the ADC for 24 it would have cost them 6,800 uh 687,695 uh which is about $450,000 difference. Correct. Yeah. I mean that's just rough math but I mean that's $450,000. So, uh, that's where we have to get to. And it could be it could be 44 45,000 over a 10-year period. It could be sooner than that. It could be less than that. As long as we have a plan. If the auditor general is just saying you have to have a plan, we'll put one out there. And I know that I've discussed this with the budget committee, finance director. I want there to be a plan. It's just I'm concerned about whether or not this gives the auditor general basic veto power over our plan is why I asked to

that's not the feel that's not the feeling we got from the auditor general. Yeah, but I read the language and the language is ambiguous enough that it could be interpreted that way. That's why I was a little concerned about it.

Mr. No, I I think we should try to follow we should have a plan. Um, you know, I learned a lot going to these meetings. You know, when you said pay as you go, you just stepped out a little like $1.3 million little thing that you didn't mention, which is very important. And that $1.3 million coming into the situation with the schools, we may have to dip into that. You know, I'm not saying we are. And then the other thing is having a plan, knowing we're at, knowing how many retirees we're expecting, how many are going to drop off. So all those things should be in front of us. One of the problem with our budget process is all this is in it's a oneline item. So I wouldn't even known about this op thing you know. So being transparent very important and getting to what we need to can be done. We don't need law for that.

Does anybody want to take an action on this? I I would like to take an action Mr. President. So I understand basically where we're at with this. The auditor general doesn't want us to oppose it because he's working on amendments. So, could we in a similar vein to what we did earlier in this evening when we were discussing sort of the uh 7676, the one about the open meetings, could we say we'll support this with an amendment that ensures that the auditor general just doesn't have veto power over our plan. Would that be an acceptable I'll make that in the form of a motion? I think that's a reasonable compromise. A question. Didn't we we voted on this? He did. We voted to oppose this. Correct.

Because what concerns me is now it's getting amendments. So, I don't know what the hell I'm voting on if they're making amendments. Now,

we found out since we listened to Mr. Trombl's explanation and he unfortunately wasn't here. We had uh they had a meeting because it brought up a lot of uh concern and they had were reached out excuse me by the auditor general who brought to their attention some facts that we didn't have. One was that we don't have to junk you that we don't have to uh fill the amount upfront. One, two, that it would be approval of a plan. And uh so we kind of felt I felt that we should out of genuine concern to all of you bring this back to you in a different form. Are we up for it or are we against it? because now we have conflicting information.

Well, I mean, the auditor general is telling you that no, I'm not going to be able to reject it. Excuse me. I'm from the government and I'm here to help you. Okay. Uh that's a big problem. You know, it's like, no, I'm not I'm never going to do that. Guess what you're going to do? I I think we just we don't need more laws. Yeah. I I I'm I'm for just leaving it alone. We've already sent a resolution, Mr. President. Yes. at the uh league's cities and towns meeting this was brought up. Uh the league is against this legislation as is currently written and that's that's what we're voting on currently written and we've already voted. So So Mr. Tromley made a motion. Is there a second? I'll second his motion.

And his motion is to support it with a uh an amendment. And what's the amendment? It uh it's um sorry one second. Essentially, the amendment is to section C, which would it's about the auditor general's power to approve or reject the plan, just clarifying that it's for notification, not for veto power. I don't know if there's a better way to phrase that. I'd leave that to the solicitor, but that's essentially what I'm most concerned about.

All right. So, I have to read this. Be it resolved by the town council of Warren, whereas House 7369 was introduced into the general assembly on January 28th, 26 by Representative Felix and others. And whereas this act would amend the audit compliance requirements for municipalities contributions to other postemployment benefits under the audit of accounts and installation of systems. And whereas specifically this act requires municipalities that contribute materially less than 100% of the actuarily determined contribution for other postemployment benefits. And this allows municipalities to develop a corrective action plan that would bring them into compliance with funding on an actuarial basis standard set forth therein. And now therefore, be it resolved by the town of Warren, by the town council of the of Warren, that section one, that the town council of the town of Warren officially expresses its support to House 7369 and respectfully requests that the honorable general assembly enact 7369, section two, that this resolution shall become effective immediately upon its passage by the Warrentown Council and the amended language would include that the auditor general not have uh what was it

that the plan that's provided to the auditor general be for notice not for approval or disapproval. Okay. Car Miss Cronin made the second. Any further discussion? The trust the trust doesn't like it. That's kind of a good That's pretty much a good red flag for me to not not be in favor of it. I I I personally don't think you need a law. I think this is common sense stuff. And you know, all cities and towns were under so much pressure. We don't need one more law just to create litigation and stuff. So I'm I'm against it. Okay. All in favor? I opposed. I

I'm against it. Next, we have the tax assessor abatements to the 2009, 2022, and 2025 tax roles in the amount of $8,59655. Mr. Disto, can we uh accept all of these as one? You can. Yes. I'll make a motion we accept the abatements for the show was the 2009 to 2022 and 2025 tax rolls in the amount of $8,596 55. Is there a second? Second. All in favor? Thank you.

Thanks. That was great. Yes. Next we have the recreation director. This is discussion and action authorization for the town manager to sign the recreational grant agreement between the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management Division of Planning and Development in the town of Warren for the purpose of veterans field improvements. Miss Dino, you have anything you want to add to that? Nope. So there's grants for $434,100 with a 25% match

and that can be in kind contributions as well. So the DPW and and you already have a little bit of money that Well, good work on this task. You took it on. Uh is there a motion to approve? I have one question. I'll second it, but I have one and discussion uh for Tony. Tony, have you you had a chance to review this language here? I have. Yes. All right. Great. It's standard. All in favor? Hi. Thank you. Next, we have discussion and action regarding awarding the 26 concession rates bid and that goes to we have so we did not receive anything. So, I ask for um permission to go out and seek a like we've done in the past.

Okay. Is I'll make a motion. Well, we don't have to reject all the bids because we didn't get any. I'll make a motion that the directive you seek out uh a vendor. Correct. Second. All in favor? I. This next we have discussion and action and authorization for the rec director to sign an agreement with the local here in Delhi and the catering regarding the summer food service program. So it we previously have always used target school district but they came in too high this year. So we had to seek a alternative uh vendor and so I'm bringing that contract to you because it's it's new.

Okay. And uh you know about this vendor is our first time. This is the first time using this vendor. Do you know of other communities that use them? I do not. It was we were it's kind of a crunch time. I worked with Ride um because normally you have you start this process in January and I the vendor came back and told me in the middle of May that they couldn't provide us meals this year. So we need Pucket Puck. Right. So I've been working with Bride to come up with a solution. Okay. So I guess we're this is this is we're going to wing it with we're going to wing it Mr. uh what's it called? Local hero. A local hero. Okay. Well, he'll be hopefully he'll be our hero. I'll make a motion to approve.

Is there a second? All in favor? I. Thank you. Next. Number four. Discussion and action and authorization for the recreation director to sign a charter bus agreement with First Student, Inc. regarding the 26 summer camp transportation services. So, this is um again, in the past, we've always had like a one-page agreement, and I've always signed it, but this was a much lengthier agreement, so I wanted Tony to look at it. And then Brian actually found some changes that needed to be made. So, um I figured it's a new document, a new contract, so bring it before you guys. Makes sense. Anthony, have you uh reviewed it?

I have. It's definitely slanted in favor of the the company. No, you won't. But I don't find anything that's so objectionable that it can't be signed. Okay. I'll make a motion we uh approve the authorization for the rec director to sign the charter bus agreement. Second. All in favor? I. Okay. And next we have the request for the use of the Warrentown Beach on Tuesdays at 8:00 a.m. from July 23rd to August 23rd, 2026 for the free yoga instructions by an Samiri. This is a uh a ask from last year. So she's just coming back. Yep. I don't think and everybody It's free. Everybody's welcome.

It is free and she has to provide insurance. And you've use her we've used utilize that service last year. She did. Yes. I'll make a motion we approve the use of Warrentown Beach for yoga. Second July 23rd to August 23rd. All in favor? Okay. Thank you. Next we have the Department of Public Works, Miss Hunt, discussion and action regarding the bid for the purchase of a used backhole loader.

Yes, good evening. Uh this is the same backhole loader that was discussed at previous meetings. It is coming from the Bristol County Water Authority. Uh we do have the funds in our equipment and vehicles budget for this uh comparable the price tag is 33,750. Uh comparable back hose we did put it out to bid. We received one bid for that backhoe. Uh comparable uh pieces of equipment are about $10 to $15,000 more. We're getting a pretty good price with this. We're working directly with the vendor. Uh we are essentially purchasing it for uh the water authorities trade in value. Um we are able to maintain it. I know that was a question. Uh it's been confirmed with the vendor. We are able to uh maintain it.

John Deere has some proprietary programs that they've changed a lot of their new equipment that you can't uh you're kind of bound to them. But this falls outside of that. Yeah. And there are certain things that we would have to send it out anyway. We do the same with our with our tractor trucks. Mr. Just a quick question. So, we're actually we're not buying it for Bristol Water Authority. We're buying it from We're buying it from the because it's part of their trade in. They had to trade it in for them to get a new one. They rotate their equipment about every 10 or 12 years. Uh so, it had to go back to the supplier for us to purchase it. So, we couldn't purchase it. Good job, Mary. This is the type of work I like to see. So, is there a motion? Can we move? I'll second it.

All in favor? Thank you. Good job, Miss Hunt. Goodbye. Nobody. Mr. Souza, Chief Souza to you and me. How are you? Good. How are you?

Okay. discussion and possible action and authorization for the fire chief to sign the CSI technology group for fire prevention module in the amount of $11,000 to be paid from fire prevention account 84500001. Yeah, this is the vendor we signed on with police and fire about a year ago for our dispatch uh system and our records management system. and just want to add the fire inspections module to uh continue improving on the uh service for the fire department and that account is out of the special fire prevention account special use account.

Okay. Is there a motion to approve? I just want to chief the for the fire inspections in in Pucket our fire department jumped on to the open go platform. I don't know if because it integrates the building with the fire. I don't know if that's something you thought about or we've been using that. Um it doesn't have as many of the features we'd like. So this is a one year. I'm going to try it and if it's not providing what we like, we'll see if we can improve on open gov. Okay. So is there a motion to approve $11,000? I'll make a motion that we approve the the chief to sign the contract for $11,000 for the uh fire prevention module. There's a second. Second.

All in favor? Thank you. Thank you. town planner is polic discussion and possible action and authorization for the town manager to sign an agreement with compete regarding shared understanding for municipal support partnership

like to explain that. So um CompeteRi is an or um an organization that was funded under Partnership for Rhode Island in 2022 and the Partnership for Rhode Island is a CEO round table of the state's largest employers and they provided resources to create competri with a focus on education um infrastructure and economic development. This is basically like a a grassroots version of municipal technical assistance. So there are going to be a limited number of compete RARI communities by becoming a competi communities. This allows me to receive support or other departments um from consultants from research and for the goal of making us more competitive for federal dollars

and there's no non-binding is pro bono. They pay the consultants directly and the consultants contract with them. Yes. Free. I'll make I'll make a motion. We authorize the town manager to sign the agreement with compete. RI. Is there a second? Second. All in favor? Uh the situation on the Holland master has been taken care of. Correct. So is there a motion to go into executive Oh, we already have the motion to go. So we're going to be going into executive session. I'm going to

and uh the meeting's over for now. We'll be coming out of executive session and the meeting will be public again. You can all go. It's regarding the police chief's contract. So, you really don't have to hear that. What's he doing? He's our employee. She works in the clerk's office.

She works in our clerk's office. some Relax your leg. Oh, okay. So, they're both going to disappear. All right.

That was that was very close.

All set. You always for me. Make a motion that we close executive session and seal the minutes. Second. All in favor? I. I'll make a motion that we uh approve the contract as presented by the solicitor and the town manager for the police chief for the next three years. Second. All in favor? I make a motion. We adjourn. Second. All in favor? I. Thank you.