City Council - Regular Meeting

All right, good evening It is June 15th It is after 7 p.m. And this is our regularly scheduled meeting of Worcester City Council being held here at Worcester City Hall

Our meeting is live here in chambers. It's also live streamed on YouTube and our next regularly scheduled meeting will be on September 8th of 2026 Miss Hamilton, please call the roll of those in attendance Here mr. Gaffey here.

Mr. Who say here? Mr. Malta here. Mr. Owens here. Mr. Paul here. Ms. Warden here

All right, we have a quorum, and the agenda will remain as presented. At this time, I'll ask you to stand and join the members of City Council in reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. Okay, you all received some slightly updated minutes from our last meeting. Do I have a motion to approve those as submitted? Motion. Is there a second? Second. All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Any opposed? Okay. Move on. Communications from the mayor. Good evening, Mr. Mayor.

Good evening, Mr. President, members of council. It's good to be back. I want to first of all thank Mr. Chersky for covering in the absence of myself and Joel at last meeting. I just had to listen to it in parts. We finally got through that today, but you know, Phil did a nice job and it was a productive meeting. First thing I have is kind of administrative in the sense that we have a reappointment to the Tax Incentive Review Council. This is an appointment I make, but council approves, and we are seeking to reappoint Ms. Alicia Holford to that body. Yeah, no council is prepared to take action on that at this point.

I believe we are I mean at this point Do we have a motion from someone on council to accept the mayor's?

Appointment motion except time.

What's that again? All right all in favor signify by saying aye aye aye any opposed aye

I just have one quick question on that, Mr. Mayor. I said in the packet that the TIRC was for a three-year appointment. I thought all of our committees were for...

And Jonathan is probably the one to have the best answer on that.

And this one is statutory? Yeah.

This one is just basically the revised code requires and mandates the composition of the board. In this specific scenario, truly there's no set time frames for this particular board. But we are just going with what their normal procedure precedent is.

OK. Good question. And I put together my notes for tonight, and then I went home real quick to grab something, and I happened to look at the Worcester Weekly News, and I think they covered most of the things I want to touch on, so I feel like almost they stole my thunder, so I'm going to plug it in there, but... You know, we're in, summer is here, even though the calendar says that's next week. School's out, highlight opera season, I think it begins this week. Freelander Pool's open. First swim meet, I think, is Wednesday. Farmer's Market's running every Saturday. Main Street Music Series. Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Unfortunately, and we'll have more on this in a little bit, we've just learned that Knightsfield Spray Ground will not be open this summer. And we're disappointed in that. And again, that'll be part of Joel and Phil's report on that. A few things since we've last met, or since Council's last met. June 5th, we had another Habitat for Humanity groundbreaking on Lucas Street that Phil and Joel were able to attend. The 9th we had a breakfast meeting. with the Wayne County Veterans Service Commission, and I was asked to speak on that. They were, and I wasn't familiar with this group before, I'd kind of heard of it, but they meet monthly up at Greystone, and they provide breakfast for any veteran and their guest, and I was expecting to talk to a crowd of 20 to 30 people, and it turned out to be more like 200, which was fine, but they were looking at the property tax issue and how it affects them And so they wanted somebody from the municipal standpoint to say, okay, and they'd had the schools in previously and the county auditor in before that. They kind of wanted to know, okay, if we abolish property taxes in Ohio, what's going to be the impact to the municipal governments, particularly Worcester? So give a quick recap on that. I think it went well. That day I also worked a shift with the Akron Canton Regional Food Bank, got to know a little bit more about their operation. Once a month they do a distribution in the parking lot there behind the old health department building there on South Street. and they had a pretty serious core of volunteers. I've been talking to people that show up every time. They had 117 individuals go through picking up various food items, and I know from working that line that a lot of those people are picking up for, you know, someone will be picking up for themselves and their next-door neighbor or picking up for themselves and some kids they have at home or somebody else. So, They had 117 people come through the line, but you know that it represented a much bigger number that are seeking food assistance in our community. So something to always keep in mind. The 10th, we had our quarterly meeting with Wayne Economic Development Council leadership. Things seem to be going well there. Things are a little slow right now in the development standpoint, which hopefully is temporary. That day, Joel and I attended the DMC distribution and collection, had a summer potluck picnic down at their garage. We were able to attend that. Then we headed to Oroville. We have periodically, it's not really quarterly, but it's periodically, we have a tri-seat at city meeting between Oroville, Redmond, and Worcester. And one of the good conversations that we had, it was timely there, and I think I mentioned this two meetings ago, is that we're working hard to get a bike path established from Worcester to Oroville. You know, Oroville's connected to that trail that eventually will get you to the towpath trail. And if you look at the trail maps, there's a big empty space between Oroville and Fredericksburg. And there's a question of where that route is. And we're very interested. And Kevin White's working quite a bit on this. We want to make sure that route, if it doesn't go through Worcester at the very least, there's access to Worcester from that route. So it was good to, that was kind of the first time we had Orville at the table for that part of the discussion, because we can talk about the logical ways to get it out of Worcester, but from where it comes out of Orville, that's really more of their discussion. We want to make sure, obviously, kind of like a railroad, you want to make sure the two ends meet up at the same place. The 10th, we had the second Wayne Center for the Arts Music on the Lawn. Those have, I think it's year two of that, and have been really well attended. Fortunately, the weather's cooperated on most occasions. Those are funded through the Levitt Foundation, and that group is coming to town July 22nd, so we're going to have a delegation meeting with them. kind of thanking them for their support of this. And if you've not made it to one of those, they are very nice events, and they have really quality musicians for those things. The 11th, Joel and I had lunch with Gabe Tudor. We've had a number of meetings the last few months trying to keep tabs on where the schools are with their plans, because And we'll talk about this in the executive session a little bit. But at some point, those plans on the schools could impact our plans of the city of Worcester. So again, more on that later. This past Saturday in the morning, there was a bike rodeo at Cornerstone put on by Worcester Police Department, supported by Worcester Kiwanis Club. And then Kids Day at the library in the afternoon. I want to thank Worcester Police Department for working both those events, and both the police department and Worcester Fire Department had equipment. Excuse me, on display at Kids Day. So they're a big hit there. Then finally, this afternoon, we had a chance to meet with the new 180 director, Freddie Robles. I think I pronounced that name correctly. I know it's Freddie, R-O-B-L-E-S. He has taken, I guess, effective June 1, Bobby Douglas' place at 180. So it's good to meet him. He's got a background with Catholic Charities in fact was involved out of Cleveland and in fact was involved in the decision to Acquire the daily record building downtown and expand there So he's already got some knowledge of the community before he starts here. So that was really positive Looking ahead. We have our first cruise in downtown this Friday and Saturday night is the Wake County Sports Hall of Fame induction. That's another thing covered here. We have three Worcester kids going in, Andrew Bender, Abby Cassandy-Majeski, and Joy Taylor. The 23rd next week, Winn Economic Development Council is having one of their regular meetings. This is going to be a property tax panel, and again, I think we've announced this before, but the constitutional amendment has gone away for this year, so we know that won't be on the ballot in 2026, but The issue hasn't necessarily gone away, so it could come back next year. If you have a chance to go to that panel, there could be some fireworks because they've had some of the people involved on the panel that were really pushing the constitutional amendment or encouraging it along. And we're going to have people in the audience. I know they're going to have school people there and some township people that are, there could be some interesting questions going on. So I'm very interested in that. Then the 23rd and 24th next week, that's when GOBA comes to Worcester. We're here for two nights. And again, a reminder of the importance of that. That's a crowd that we want to have in town. And those are people with disposable income and like to eat out. And very glad to have them on a once every five or 10 year basis. But if we could tap into that market regularly, it'd be great for our community. The 26th, the Wayne Center for the Arts is opening their Arts Park. So they're doing some opening. I think there's a preview opening on Friday night and a grand opening Saturday. And then July 16th, the last thing I'll mention is the Wayne County Humane Society's Christmas in July fundraiser. And I'll just say, you know, you will have a chance to bid at the auction for breakfast with the mayor. And before you scoff at that, I'll just let you know that last year someone paid $700 for that privilege. So I got to remind my wife all the time about how valuable her opportunity to meet with me and have breakfast with me every day is. Yeah, she wasn't impressed either. All right. I told you we talked about Knightsfield a little bit. I'll kick it over to Joel and Akeem Field. We're going to touch on that and some other things. Okay.

Yeah. Um, we had, uh, I think they would be sent out a message or Phil sent out a message. Was it, uh, late last week? We had a message ready to go because we had encountered some issues at night's field. Um, we're going to be sharing a little more additional information. I'll let Phil share a little bit more of that when it comes to night's field.

Yeah, so we included it in the memo and put out a public notice to the public public notice to the public. That's redundant. put out a notice to the public about Knightsfield. We've been getting questions whether or not it would be opening. We've been dealing with some maintenance issues down there, unforeseen electrical failure at the site. Put it in short, they went on to turn on the pumps. The pumps are Winterized each year, everything looked good in the fall when they went to flip it on. It blew the line out of the AP transformer AP had to come out, fix it. Flipped it again, blew the circuits down there in the building. That was the straw that broke the pumps backs. You know, finally put them out of order. We've been working to get replacements. Money is not the issue and getting the replacement pumps. It's the timing. We're at about a 1 month delay and how soon those can come. So, with that, if we ordered it today, wouldn't be here until the middle of July. Pool season ends August 15th, so we'd have a matter of weeks if they're on time. Uh, the 1 thing we've been working on all day with is, uh, because of this, we are going to, and I'll read it as we're going to prepare for the news release. To accommodate those who are impacted by the Knightsfield closure, Worcester's newest public transportation service, Wago, is adding a special temporary stop to the Freelander pool. The way that'll work is it's free fare to the pool for any patron that was going to visit Knightsfield. There's a bus stop right there at Community Action. Anyone that is going to the pool can hop on the bus for free. And there is going to be an additional stop that's going to be right outside Freelander. So, those that don't have access to the spray ground can hop on the bus. Go up to freelander swim, get back on the bus, get back down to community action. That way they have transportation to aquatic facility. Um, anyone that is 12 or over is able to ride the bus. Anyone under the age of 12 is required to have an adult, which also syncs up pretty well with our policy at the pool. Anyone 13 or over is allowed to be on a company by an adult. Anyone under the age of 13 has to have an adult. So we shouldn't have any worries about. Little kids riding the bus. But yeah, so that's the update. We got the final approval from ODOT about three o'clock today. Worked it out with Wago. That service will start Saturday because Wago is not open on Juneteenth this Friday. So it'll start Saturday. Well, they're supposed to be 75. So hopefully we'll get the word out as quick as possible to those that are impacted by this. It's unfortunate, but this kind of stuff happens.

Thanks Bill, and just 1 other piece, I'm going to try to take advantage of a. You know, I'm an unfortunate situation to get some feedback from the users of nights field. That's something we've been planning anyway, as we've been keeping track of. Our usage of our aquatic facilities nice feels like between 2 to 3% 3 of our overall usage. So very, very small percent, but we also know it's it's in a neighborhood. That uses that so we've been planning on trying to get some feedback on who uses it and where they live. And so we're going to take advantage of, I guess, the opportunity as people call in. And also, as it's on top of mind to reach out and survey, you know, our community and the neighborhood and get some feedback. On that as we move forward, so I just wanted to share that. And just a couple other things, just a couple of highlights from the, the, uh. the updates our worcester work updates probably noticed a few tweaks landry's been doing a great job getting that into a little bit more of a you know formal update newsletter and we're going to start we've been sharing that with more people in the public and we'll be putting that on our website as well so just for the people that might be listening or watching just to let them know there's you know there's a wealth of information on all the operations and i'll just hit a couple highlights in there um if you haven't been down bell avenue bell avenue you'll see that parking lot you know that uh council had over the years. We've acquired the property and now we're going to clean that up a little bit and make a nice little gateway parking lot there that's underway right now. I just want to point that out. Concrete pavement replacements, we're starting those right now around various places in the community so people probably see that. Christmas run pool renovations are ongoing, getting the site ready. If you've driven by there, you can't get in there. If you've driven by, you'll see there's quite a bit of earth moving that has gone on. They started in earnest on the East Milltown and Melrose shared path. You know a lot of work on Melrose getting the base established, and then they so they did the Melrose piece, and then now they're moving from Melrose on Milltown towards Towards the West there, so that's that's underway right now. They're doing a good job driven through there several times. They're doing a good job keeping traffic moving, minimizing the impact point that out. We had another bid, one of our major projects, 11 major projects that's been bid out this year. The total bids are just over 6 million major infrastructure projects. Our estimates for those were just over seven. So, so far this year through half the year, we've come in about a million dollars under what our estimates were for those projects. So that that's good news a couple more coming up the arts district streetscape. They're going to get a piece of that. We have sort of a larger, a larger area. We're going to do that includes the health department building, which got authorization to get demolished. So we've been talking to commissioners. They're going to get that demolished and open that up. For us to redevelop that that area and utilize that sort of like, would you feel right now? It belongs to the. to the commissioners but we run soccer programs and that kind of thing so they're going to let us develop that spot down there so we're looking forward to that'll be like a second third phase of the streetscape down there which is nice that'll go right along with you know what the way center for the arts is doing with their with their improvements down there a couple other things uh urban forestry just want to point this out because it's always neat when we have uh volunteers that really help us out. Matthew Lee, a Worcester High School student, and four volunteers, they planted 100 of 200 tree seedlings at Oak Hill Park. So they did a lot of work there. We just wanted to give a shout out to them. And if you read down further towards the middle of our report, you've noticed that our water usage has gone up, or production has gone up quite a bit. And that's not really because, a little bit of the residential, but mostly because of Daisy. They continue to ramp up, have continued over the years. So we look back over the last few years, about a 200,000 gallon per year increase over the last three years. So you can see that's good. We're still not up to our maximum capacity, but that's That's good to see that. And Bob mentioned the land bank and the But the land bank and health probably already spoke about one on the habitat. We also talked to. That's also the land bank, and and they they said a lot of nice things about the coordination and cooperation between the city county land bank habitat as they continue to, you know, get lots and make those available for for families that really need that. So just wanted to point that out. You've all probably also noticed it's springtime so that means property maintenance issues tend to. Um, start to increase a little bit. So if you've looked at that portion, there's that that's quite an extensive list of property maintenance. Our property maintenance crews are being very busy with a lot of different things out there. And I also just want to point out Jonathan briefly mentioned the housing interest. We have been we've had quite a few meetings over the last couple of months with various developers from different areas of the state really interested in housing development and mixed use developments in Western. So nothing, nothing solid yet, but a lot of inquiries. And so hopefully a couple of those will come to fruition. And Last Arrow up over on Melrose Drive, they announced a $3 million investment and about 25 new people up there where they have some facilities. So that's exciting to hear that. And the last piece was a, we added a memo in there from John Rice, our city engineer, where we had met with a resident up in the Ulster County Transportation Council Chambers. City Council Chambers, Eric would be the one that possibly you know we could we could justify there, but for people have been on Council for a while has come up before unimproved streets. City Council Chambers, When we talked about sidewalks that's where we did inquire a couple times and there wasn't a consensus of the neighbors up in there, because. City Council Chambers, You know, a good portion of that would have to be assessed and so there wasn't a consensus, so we haven't moved forward there's not like a real pressing safety need right now, but you know with. We have a bike path over on Burbank, and we're going to be doing some improvements with the kidney and over there by the hospital. Maybe now's the time to think about maybe one more connection. There is one just south of that school court all the way over, but we're going to look into that a little more and we'll present some information. One of the challenges on an unimproved street like that is you'll end up spending more money on the drainage and storm sewer and filling in ditches than you will on the sidewalk. So we're going to investigate that here over the summer and probably present you some options, and you can decide. We've also asked the one resident if he could go back, talk to his neighbors and see if there's a consensus, if they're interested in something. So that's sort of the summary. I don't know, John, if you had anything else you wanted to add.

That's a good summary.

I'll just add, you know, sometimes people ask the question of why did the city of Worcester ever let those roads go in like that in that condition without the storm sewer, without the sidewalks? Well, that all went in while that was outside the city of Worcester. It was the village of Bloomington at that point. And that's one of those things when you take in an annexation of developed land, you take it warts and all. And so that's kind of how... One of the considerations, you know, when an annotation of development comes in is okay, knowing that at some point we'll probably have to make those improvements and. Maybe that day has come for some of these.

Mayor, I get 2 things.

Okay, I'll get back to you on that.

Okay, cool.

So. You're pretty done. Looking at the agenda review real quick. Six items of new business. One, two, and six require three readings or a suspension of the rules. Three, four, and five are budgeted. We have asked for an executive session to discuss two real property matters. um to wrap up i want to thank phil also for covering the moral day parade um want to make sure we had that covered and phil was happy to do it and it really worked out i was disappointed i wasn't able to be here for that but i it really worked out well i don't know that phil mentioned this but he did mention that he had his dad and his son in his in the car with him but phil's dad's a veteran and he was recognized at the cemetery and i think that was uh

Yeah, he, uh, yeah, he called me about a week later after he had a chance to collect his feelings and he made the comment as he was crying on the phone. It's the 1st time he's ever been recognized for a service in Vietnam. Um, so really, uh, kind of. Wrapped it up for me, it was, it was kind of cool. So just, you know, so it works out.

Well, I mean, it's 1 of those things we kind of stumbled into, but everyone's just. Get lucky. And I'm glad that worked out well for Phil and especially for his dad. And I bet your son's going to remember that too.

Someday he'll appreciate it.

Just a quick wrap up on upcoming the final thing we have is that the the events that Phil's alluded to and I'm gonna kick it over to him Phil has done everybody's a lot of work on this, but Phil's probably been the point person July 3rd and there's another handout. I'm not sure you have copies yet, but you'll know this has been in different things Friday July 3rd is a customary music on the square but um there we kind of spent some additional money through main street for the musical entertainment so it's a uh ccr little ronstadt tribute band and through some work through phil and i think with some help from greg one we're gonna have a military flyover that night so weather cooperating as i understand memorial day they were not seen but just heard hopefully uh the weather will cooperate july 3rd and you will see and hear the flyover Then July 4th, OLO Orchestra is on the square. Not just the orchestra, OLA Choir, I think, is on the square. And then Fireworks at Dark and Kinney Field. Again, we put some more money into this in light of the 250th, and we think that's going to be special. Again, whether cooperating, and I can't say this often enough, Gilning and the Fireworks Foundation, which may be not much more than Gilning, I have put a ton of work into this, and if you see him, thank him. That's that's just a good rule of thumb at all times. See, go. Thank you. And then finally, July 5th, we're wrapping things up as far as the weekend and the two fiftieth. It runs all year, but as far as our big weekend is Sunday, July 5th, and Phil, you got Phil again has been pointed out. He's got information on that.

Yes, this is out on our been out on our social media. We are working with the rotary club to do a picnic. The suggested from the 250 head group was like a community picnic. So rotary jumped on that with us. It'll be down on market from Liberty to North street. Uh, the community band will be there, uh, elected officials will be reading off the, uh, elected mayors will be reading off, uh, the declaration of independence. There will also be activities for kiddos to do, uh, part of the national American 250 committee is they have these. activity picnic baskets which have all kinds of coloring and kite building and anything you could imagine that the ymca and the library have both said that they will help us out with we're going to have some bounce houses down there and of course some food trucks for people to come and just enjoy the day bring your chair hang out with your family listen to some music stop by you know don't you know stay the whole time but come come celebrate But I also wanted to take a second to talk about the website. I know the last time I mentioned that the new website's live. I really want to encourage everyone to go and watch the how-to video on how to sign up for eNotify. I will beat this drum. It is one of the best features about this website that a person can sign up to be notified when right now we have it set up for any time a council agenda is put out. anytime there's a new news article anytime there's a general or anytime there's a road closure or anytime there's an event you sign up you can pick which ones you want if it's updated you will get an email that says boom this is going on that way people can get information more readily because i hear from a lot of people we don't have social media we don't have a newspaper Well, now you have this, so sign up for it. You can opt out at any time and if we'll have a survey at some point, once people get used to it of what other features on the website they would like to get notified of. Um, because kind of just guessing right now, I figured the most important ones are the road closures. So, but. Watch that push that out to the residents. This is our conduit to get information out there. So.

So with that, Mr. President, thank you for your time. And I wish you and council a great summer.

Ordinance number 2026 dash 14, an ordinance to approve and adopt current replacement pages to the codified ordinances and allowing for immediate enactment.

Thank you Mr. president. Uh, yeah, this is a fairly straightforward request. Um, just. Periodically, we, um, update our codified ordinances with, uh, what's been going on down in Columbus. So this is just 1 of those, uh, efforts. I will admit I did not read each and every line, Mr. Abernathy, but the majority of it is traffic related. Um, just some additions, some amendments, um, nothing out of the ordinary. There are a couple changes to, um. uh regarding animal animals uh you know dogs running at large and that that sort of thing and then a couple things related to fireworks but nothing out of the ordinary uh miss uhler's here uh for any specific questions i do know the request was to we can uh to try to move forward with this now just um biggest concern just so that chief fisher and his crew can actually uh, enforce some of these things, and there's not any kind of legal gray area over the summer break.

Did I miss anything?

No, no, that sounded good. If any questions you think that Mr. Zay did an excellent job recapping it.

I think the only question I have is how are we going to push this out to the public? The information, the changes, specifically fireworks, since that's coming very quickly.

These are all changes in state law that are in effect and our ordinances are just matching the state law. So in American Legal Publishing, they will update our code electronically online. So anyone has questions about that? are codified ordinances they're available online and of course they can always reach out to the law department okay so phil is that an example of something somebody if they're signed up properly would get notified

Probably not each and every of the 200. That'd be a good way to get them to unsubscribe.

Updates to the code. They can't say no one told us. Yeah, we can.

It's a different website since it's on ALP. Yeah, we can work that out.

Yeah, and I mean all of our codified ordinances and our charter are available online for anybody who cares to look through them. But really, it's just for the folks who have to actually enforce this stuff.

I have a question. So when did the state update theirs? It would depend.

Amy, do you know the individual?

I don't know that the problem is that it takes so long for our service to do all these updates that these things have been on the books of the state for quite some time. And in effect, we just have to officially adopt them into ours to make things coordinate. It's just the time lag between when we send the things to our codified fire company and when we get it back and done this.

and and the police department for example i know like with the animal the dog laws you know they've been i've advised you know site under state law until we can get caught up and now they'll be able to cite under our codified ordinances which are there's a benefit to the city and that the fines and penalties the money comes to the city no further questions i have to uh spend

Mr. Hussay.

Yes.

Mr. Paul. Yes. Mr. Owens.

Yes.

Mr. Abernathy. Yes. Ms. Warden. Yes. Mr. Malta.

Yes.

Mr. Gaffey.

Yes.

Second. Second.

Mr. Houssaye?

Yes.

Mr. Paul?

Yes.

Mr. Owens? Yes. Mr. Abernathy? Yes. Ms. Worden? Yes. Mr. Malta? Yes. Mr. Gaffey?

Yes.

Next ordinance, 2026-15. Ms. Hamilton, please read for us.

Ordinance number 2026-15, an ordinance amending the annual appropriation ordinance and allowing for immediate enactment.

Mr. Abernathy, the floor is yours.

Thank you. Well, the city was awarded the Small Cities Community Development Block Grant. So for the CHIP program. And the thing is, we didn't appropriate for it in the budget. And so because we got that money, We now want to retroactively put it into the budget. So it doesn't get any more simple than that. We now have money we didn't have before, and we'd like to put it back into the budget. So if there's any questions, we can certainly grill Mr. Dordia on that. Please.

Thank you. This is like the first time this has happened. This has happened almost annually.

Every two years, Jonathan applies. So you actually gave Jonathan the authority back in May of last year. You, the council, gave him authority to apply for this grant and to go into partnership agreement with Oroville and Wayne County. And so he submitted the application. We got notified. And this council is going on a break. And the funds will be available with 7-1. That would be probably a good idea to submit this to those funds budget business.

It's possible this could happen potentially again this year, because I know that we just recently gave... It's possible. We get that grant that we just approved a meeting or two ago.

We've also changed the way we're electronically doing the legislation, so I'll get this legislation and review it, and I will recommend a certain language, and it's hereby appropriated if awarded, and that would cover us then

Any questions or comments?

I would say my comment would be, if we were to do it that way, Andre, I would hate to miss out. I mean, it is nice to see how much, if we are awarded anything, it is nice to see what that is. Right, because it could get lost in the shuffle otherwise. So, I mean, yeah.

No problem.

Anyone else? Well, I believe we need to suspend the rules for this one, so I'll motion to suspend the rules. Second.

Mr. Abernathy. Yes. Mr. Gaffey.

Yes.

Ms. Warden. Yes. Mr. Huizet.

Yes.

Mr. Owens.

Yes.

Mr. Paul.

Yes.

Mr. Malta.

Yes.

Motion to adopt.

Second. Mr. Abernathy. Yes. Mr. Gaffey. Yes.

Yes.

Ms. Warden? Yes. Mr. Huze?

Yes.

Mr. Owens? Yes. Mr. Paul? Yes. Mr. Malta?

Yes.

resolution number 2026-37 a resolution authorizing the director of administration to enter into a professional services contract for cleaning of three stripping towers and allowing for immediate enactment thank you this is to clean our stripping towers as per our permit mr fritz is here with us tonight if there's any very specific questions

Generally speaking, we go with Rvi, which is a local company. They're experienced in doing this. I've done it in the past. We do this on a regular basis. Aren't any questions. It is a budgeted item.

Mr. Fritz, can you enlighten me? Why do we clean the I-7 one three times and I-2 and six only twice?

Because it's got a larger capacity it processes water by seven runs. A million gallons a day through it. By six is a half million gallons a day and I two is something like I remember correctly about accordingly. So the frequency kind of runs with that the water quality. Um, and I six and seven is a little worse with iron. So there's more. There's more iron dropping out and that's what's clogging the filters requirement to be cleaned. So.

It just it just kind of runs with it was just curious that stood out.

Yep, um, will residents notice any.

Issues with their water during this time, or no, all the water through the service powers is discharged. Right back to, um, either kill, but 3 or.

So, it's not part of the drink. Further questions.

Motion to adopt motion to adopt by Mr. Second. Second by Mr. Abernathy. Ms. Hamilton, please call the roll on the adoption.

Mr. Malta.

Yes.

Mr. Huze.

Yes.

Mr. Paul.

Yes.

Mr. Abernathy. Yes. Ms. Warden. Yes. Mr. Owens. Yes. Mr. Gaffey.

Yes.

Okay. Next item, resolution 2026-38. Ms. Hamilton, you can please read it for us.

Resolution number 2026-38, a resolution authorizing the expenditure of additional funds for laboratory services and allowing for immediate enactment.

Mr. Malte, the floor is yours. Thank you. We're going over budget here a little bit. What a shocker. Again, Mr. Fritz is here for any very specific questions. We use Allaway Labs now. They've been acquired. And so we're having not really major changes, just an acquisition. Just going to cost us a little more money.

That's the simple explanation that we in the past we split the lab services between your offense and Halloway Eurofins was the only approved PFAS lab. So we were using them for all of our PFAS sampling and then earlier this year Eurofins acquired Allaway. And so now it's all one vendor. So when we combined all the charges that went over the over the minimum. So we're just trying to get approval to use only Europe. There are alternative labs, but it's it's easier for us. We have a longer history, and we've gotten a better service from the hallway before it was merged with Europe. And so we're kind of hoping it stays the same.

In the future, what kind of review will we have over your offense performance?

We kind of know every month whether they're doing a good job. We'll probably monitor them a little bit closer, but when they purchased Alloway, they didn't... They didn't make any staffing changes, so basically, they just kind of put their name over the top of the door and continuity of service with an increase in cost.

Well, there's no increase in cost. No, these are 2 separate contracts.

Oh, there are they blending the other voices together? That's why we're over.

Okay. Okay. That I understand.

So, arguably counsel to have more oversight. Now, they did before because when they were separate, you never saw. But now that we combine them and go over that threshold, so we'll come to council.

So, potentially, we may get some efficiency at it.

Potentially yeah, you don't see very very very well. They bought them and they purchased them and they, they put it under their, their. Their business, but they didn't make any changes really that all the staffing, all the offices, they didn't consolidate any of the labs together. So, it's, it's really going forward is. the same as it was before.

Well, they made the billing a little more efficient. Yeah, we'll get one bill instead of two.

But yeah, that's pretty much it.

So going up, going forward, will our price for these same services, do we expect that to increase?

Well, they're always increasing them. They're probably, I would say if I went back and looked at it, there was probably even smaller increases over the years. The covered you know they're they're they're inflation and their costs so we don't generally see like a large increase on something unless there's been some change in that in the rules or in testing okay.

And one thing we can do, and we do this periodically, is just go out and get some bullets, you know, just to keep them honest.

Yeah, there's some other labs. The reason we did sole source the PFAS sampling with Eurofins was they were the approved labs. the only approved lab to do PFAS testing to qualify it for the class action systems that we were involved in. So in order to get qualifying samples for that, and that is how they determine your settlement amount, you basically were forced to use Eurofins for everything. It's just kind of odd that they stepped in and bought Alloway, at least, you know, one of those things, I guess.

If there are no further questions, I move to adopt. Motion to adopt by Mr. Malta. Is there a second?

Second.

Second. Ms. Hampton, please call the roll on the adoption.

Mr. Malta.

Yes.

Mr. Gaffey.

Yes.

Ms. Warden. Yes. Mr. Huze.

Yes.

Mr. Owens.

Yes.

Mr. Paul.

Yes.

Mr. Abernathy.

Yes.

Resolution 2026-39, which will be the trifecta for Mr. Malta this evening, but Ms. Hamilton, please read it for us.

Resolution number 2026-39, a resolution authorizing the expenditure of additional funds for the purchase of parts and supplies for utility infrastructure and allowing for immediate enactment.

Mr. Malta, the floor is yours.

Thank you. So another one here that we've gone over budget. in short, simple, sweet terms. I know we had a valve replacement that what four thousand dollars.

Yeah, there's there's some we didn't pick up um corn main is is usually the um preferred vendor if you're looking for something fast and close. And they've got offices. Um, they've got one in Mass and one in Ashland, and they're nationwide. So yeah, we needed a we needed a replacement valve for the Madison booster once the contractor started the word, we discovered there was one of the files that he needed to shut the boosting down was. Not working and, um. So we quickly found one through core in Maine. So we avoid by purchasing it and getting it delivered here. We avoided twenty percent markup from the vendor. So we've done that in some situations where where we can purchase this stuff directly. But again, it feeds into that. all of the other stuff that we buy from them as well. So we bump into that seventy five thousand or so pretty quickly.

Yeah. So we're not over budget. We budget, you know, for replacement parts and things like that. This usually happens every year, just depending on the number of valves and pipes and pieces of parts that we ended up. We're just exceeding the amount for expending without bidding or just over a threshold. Yeah, right. That's all right. It is budgeted, right?

Sorry No further questions Motion to adopt second Please call the roll on the adoption.

Mr. Malta.

Yes.

Mr. Abernathy.

Yes.

Mr. Gaffey.

Yes.

Mr. Paul.

Yes.

Ms. Warden. Yes. Mr. Owens. Yes. Mr. Who's a yes.

I Okay, last item this evening, Resolution 2026-40. Ms. Hamilton, please read that for us.

Resolution number 2026-40, a resolution to appropriate grant funds received from the Ohio Law Enforcement Body Armor Program and allowing for immediate enactment.

Mr. Gaffey, the floor is yours. All right. Yeah, this one's pretty straightforward. Basically, last year, the police department purchased new bulletproof vests for most of the officers. After that purchase was made, they had applied for and received a grant from the AG's office to pay for 75% of the cost. The reimbursement will be received will be getting about $15,890 and 12 cents, and so this is to basically approve receipt of that and allocate it back to the police department's equipment budget. Pretty straightforward. Any questions at all. Okay. This is not a budgeted item. I think we do need to move to place on certain file.

Yes, we need the motion. Yes, we do. So you've moved. You've moved to do this. Second. Ms. Hamilton, please pull the roll.

Mr. Gaffey.

Yes.

Ms. Warden. Yes. Mr. Paul.

Yes.

Mr. Owens. Yes. Mr. Malta.

Yes.

Mr. Huze. Yes. Mr. Abernathy. Yes.

Move to adopt. Motion to adopt. Is there a second? Second. Second.

Mr. Gaffey?

Yes.

Ms. Wharton? Yes. Mr. Paul? Yes. Mr. Owens? Yes. Mr. Malta?

Yes.

Mr. Huze? Yes. Mr. Abernathy?

Yes. Okay, well that takes care of our new business. The administration has asked us to go into executive session, so if I could have a motion to move into executive session. Motion. Is there a second? Second.

Mr. Abernathy? Yes. Mr. Gaffey? Yes. Mr. Houssaye?

Yes.

Mr. Malta?

Yes.

Mr. Owens?

Yes.

Mr. Paul? Yes. Ms. Wharton? Yes.

Okay. There will be an executive session for as long as the administration wants to bend our ear.

Motion to come out of?

All right, yes. Motion to come out of executive session. Second. Second. Ms. Hampton, please call the roll on the coming out of executive session.

Mr. Abernathy.

Yes.

Mr. Gaffey. Yes. Mr. Huze.

Yes.

Mr. Malta.

Yes.

Mr. Owens.

Yes.

Mr. Paul.

Yes.

Ms. Warden. Yes.

Okay, we're out of executive session. We'll move on to the last piece this evening of miscellaneous, and we'll start with Mr. Gaffey.

All right. Yeah, I mean, I don't really have a whole lot to add tonight aside from, you know, looking forward to summer break here and just hope everybody has a safe and enjoyable summer. Appreciate everybody watching online and those of you that have come tonight. Thank you, Mr. Warden.

He stole what I was going to say. No, I wanted to say, I see Chief Fisher's gone, but I did have the opportunity to meet a couple of Worcester's officers downtown this weekend, and they were just kind of doing additional patrol because it was so busy and crowded and there were a lot of activities going on. They were excellent. They were in good spirits. They were in a party environment. They were having a kickoff party downtown, and um they were very charming and and um i know that it can sometimes feel a little bit um awkward when police walk into a environment like that but they were awesome and they were very respectful um so i'd like to thank thank them for that and i would like to wish everybody a happy fourth of july a little early thank you mr malta thank you thank you for those joining us tonight and staying a long time waiting for us to come back

and all those watching happy fourth of july to everybody let's celebrate 250. mr owens yeah um i want to echo hope everyone has a happy safe summer um i also want to uh thank everyone who came out to the pride event at christmas run on the six uh we had about four to five hundred people they're still tallying the the final numbers. And I also want to thank Phil and Properties Maintenance. We had a fuse that blew because you can't plug in a grill and a deep fryer into the same one. But I reached out to Phil and very quickly we had someone out there to flip the breaker back on and save the day. If I knew it was for an electric grill...

Might have been different charge well in fairness you didn't ask yeah Fair enough, and that was Jim Houser by the way, so thanks to Jim.

Thank you to Jim Yeah a couple things tonight mr. President the labor First and foremost I do want to looking at the calendar Call a Laws and Ordinances Committee meeting for our first meeting out of break. I believe that's September the 8th. Oh, Andrea.

I made a sad face because I'll be in Alaska, but I'm sorry.

We can teams you in. But no, mostly to the end of this year, we're scheduled to have our recreational events. marijuana moratorium come off i'd like to have that discussion before budget season um so if the administration can get some intel from what's the latest at columbus um you know we've talked about reimbursements and laws and that sort of thing um maybe pull some statistics or anything from the hospital what they're seeing as well with this stuff um just so that council can have the discussion and see if we want to continue the moratorium moving forward.

And knowing that that is slated to be coming up, then I can look into that issue, any legal guidance in advance, and you guys can always reach out. If I have access from Alaska, you're more than welcome to text.

Yeah, because regardless, I'd assume that whatever piece of legislation comes up before us, we'll let it go through the readings and make sure everybody's heard on this one. A couple of weeks ago, chief Fisher invited me up to the safety center, and he and the assistant chief of Tolo showed me their flock system. I know that came up recently. I'm sure he would offer you the same demonstration if anybody has reached out to him or been invited very informative and I have no questions with flock. And as I said before, as long as chief Fisher is. Assistant chief rotolo is there? I'm fully in support of the police department and then lastly yes, just happy 4th of July. I hope everyone stays safe and enjoys their summer and we'll see everybody. We'll get back to work in earnest.

September the 8th.

Yes, yes, just to give the administration time to kind of present. What the landscape is across the state of Ohio, and then obviously have plenty of time for council members to kind of throw their hat in the ring with what they're seeing hearing from constituents and all that good stuff.

Yeah, since we won't see the budget until the third week of sure. Yeah, that at that point, I mean, we'll have ample time to should this. Which I don't think it will, but I'd like to be wrapped up before budget season. Everyone will. Mr. Paul.

Thank you, Mr. President. Phil kind of ran point on this, but I want to commend you for coming up with a rather unique solution to a problem down at Knightsfield for the people that we serve down there. I know it's not what they wanted to hear, but we at least tried to find an equitable solution that allowed them to enjoy their summer, so great job on that. Today at Rotary, I had the opportunity to sit with a bunch of Rotarians, and we were entertained by the Ohio Light Opera. And for those of you, if you haven't been to an Ohio light opera performance is quite a cultural tradition here in town. And what they do is really amazing. So I'd like to encourage everybody in the community to get out, see a show or two this summer and take advantage of what's literally in our backyard. The performances and the quality of performance is really great today. And I was thrilled to get a chance to look at it. Also, like everybody else, it's the 4th of July, but this is a special 4th of July. You know, our country has its issues. I'm not going to beat around the bush about that, but we've got 250 years of a lot of good things, too. And maybe we need to take a moment and just celebrate some of the things we do right instead of being so focused on the things we do wrong. So thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Abernathy. Thank you. Just towards the end of our executive session, I was sharing with the mayor that, you know, in my travels for work, I spend a lot of time in Akron and Canton, and I do a lot of networking. And there's a very consistent theme. And that consistent theme is our downtown is one of the most talked about downtowns. When people ask me where I'm from and I say Worcester, they're just like, my God, I love going to your downtown. It is a destination. The restaurants down there are great. The places to go get a drink, the entertainment is fantastic. And, you know, for anybody watching, I just, I encourage you don't take it for granted. This is our backyard. This is our home. And we have just this fantastic place that we call home in this incredible downtown area that we should absolutely be taking advantage of. So please, this summer, you know, I know there's a lot of things to do outside, but continue to support the small businesses downtown and support all of our friends and family and neighbors. They're going to need your support and to keep this fantastic and now what I think is famous downtown Worcester. So with that, have a great summer and everybody stay safe.

Okay. Before we go, though, I do have a quick question. South Walnut and South Street, West South Street, is that intersection going to get light or is it going to stay four-way? Right there at the old health department building.

I think they did the traffic study and converted it to a four-way.

It's going to stay as a four-way. It doesn't matter. I just periodically have driven through there and I'm like, I don't know what's going to happen. Okay.

I think the traffic commission, that was one that it went up before with them, but yeah.

Motion to adjourn, is there a second? Second. All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye.