##VIDEO ID:J9n2HA3IdaA## e e e good morning welcome to the special meeting of the Newark Municipal Council on Tuesday October 8th 2024 in accordance with New Jersey Law adequate notice of this meeting has been provided to The Star Ledger the Jersey journal and the public at large establishing the date time and location of this meeting in addition the agenda for this meeting was disseminated on October 4th 2024 at the time of preparation and posted on the website of the city of Newark roll call please Council Gonzales present Kelly here in attendance Ramos absent Scott rry Silva absent president Crump present council president council members we are on page four of the agenda item 7r2 as is to execute a community benefits agreement to execute the community benefits agreement for 81-93 Orange Street urban renewal LLC on Tuesday October 8th 2024 in City Hall council chambers and today is the continuation of the first public hearing last Wednesday if there is anyone who has not spoken who wants to speak to this item please approach the podium Lisa Parker one when you have an agreement with someone I'm sorry I'm sorry Miss Parker did you speak at the last no I did not no I didn't okay you're interrupting my time put my time back it was two seconds go go please go two seconds and I'm standing here arguing with you and my time isn't put back thank you Lisa Parker as a matter of any agreements that you make with the community that calls for Community engagement what I heard the last time I was here you had a Comm commity meeting in 2021 that two people attended explain to me how they came here last week trying to get you to give them a community agreement and it was stated that they were supposed to have Community engagement so are you calling this special today a community engagement when people are at work nobody could weigh in on what they want in terms of the project we haven't heard anything about a project labor agreement that your hiring people to give them a living wage and benefits every time Allison lad comes up here lying to the people about the engagement about Community input the only thing that she said that was a truth is every time y'all come with a developer it's between the city and the developer and not the people that live in these communities so explain to me how you bringing this back and calling it engagement as a public hearing there's a stark difference in community engagement and a public hearing when did they meet with the community from last week to this week we are already know in the central Ward we didn't get services from the former person that was um the elected there and now you're trying this today tell me how you putting this on the agenda to pass it when they haven't done Community engagement explain that to me every time the people come before this Podium to talk about anything in this city the people are disregarded all you social media Advocates you need to start coming down to these public hearings and Council meetings to let your voice be heard because that's why they continue to get away with not honoring the people that pay their fair share of taxes which we know the developers don't and this regard the rule of law of what you're supposed to do in terms of a process give the people their rights thank you for your comments next speaker this this is only for speakers who did not speak at the last meeting Miss Alters I believe you spoke at the last meeting yeah yes she did right public hearing is open from from the last meeting so it's continuation so if you spoke at the last hearing okay then you cannot speak again just like any other okay so so explain so at the at the end of at the end we may have some comments from the administration any other speakers state your name for the record juwel Baskerville I'm sorry you got to speak up a little bit juel Baskerville okay thank you hello Council my name is juwel since coming home from University I've been horrified by the decrease in affordable housing that has taken place over the last few years so I appreciate the council for postponing yet another luxury apartment to hear from the community as Bolton development uh attorney mentioned last meeting this project is not brand new when I first heard of this project last year I was pretty hopeful um from tap into norc article as of uh September of last year quote as initially proposed in 2021 this building would have 87 Studios 159 one-bedrooms 104 two bedroom apartments with 70% ear marked as affordable for low to medium income people and Families remaining Apartments will be marketed at market rate another quote NJ Eda tax credits for this new apartment complex come from the Aspire program which CEO Tim Sullivan said is meant to expand housing options increase affordability and create strong communities fast forward three years later this proposal is a sign in some art on the wall um and minimum affordable housing that was conventionally left out what happened my guess is that these developers found out that they could give us less than bare minimum and our officials would take it in the last meeting one of the speakers mentioned the vacancies of all these Luxury Apartments is that something being monitored that the public has access to people deserve to know how many empty 2,000 plus $2,000 plus studios are collecting dust especially the people who are on a very long waiting list for housing lottery I actually got it here uh this one is 60 pages long and about 2,000 people and that's one of the shorter ones there's another one with 131 Pages um just a side note uh running out of time please do research on the developers that you're accepting these projects from nor has one of the largest black communities in New Jersey thank you for your comments I'll leave that there thank you for your comments thank you next speaker Mana El bumani a community benefits agreement between the city of Newark first of all this shouldn't even be on the agenda today there should be a community benefits meeting not between the city of nor but between central War residents and the citizens of newor you have this on the agenda 10: a.m in the morning without central Ward organizations housing uh uh Advocates uh homeowners and Etc to vote on this today this is this totally unacceptable and then again citizens of newth at the sound of my voice we should be pushing for a community benefits agreement that is attached to any agreement in the city of newk that have a list of central Wars or organizations from this from the city and we should have you sign it with whatever we want in a community benefits agreement this is not about what y'all want because we know clearly that we're not getting the Equitable housing the Equitable jobs where's the Equitable commission at and what are they doing anyway because nothing is Equitable for the lifelong residents of this city this is this is Criminal and that's why we continue to come up here and call you corrupt cult no other way to describe you no other way because it it's clear as plain and day that y'all don't represent the residents of the city it is just plain and simple because if you allowed to vote on this today and if you vote on it today corrupt coat no other way to describe you because where's the Central Waters at in the city 10:00 a.m. in the morning pushing something that y'all want because you want the exper uh tax uh credits and she came up here uh the other day and try to push y'all to push it then and you put it on the agenda on a special meeting today criminal criminal cult no other way to describe you fail leadership no other way to describe you unacceptable thank you for your comments next speaker down to Jackson North resident as the previous speakers have said as I asked at the last council meeting probably during this um another hearing of this magnitude what is the count of the apartments downtown I bet you you don't even know there are people moving out of teachers Village because of the mold and the conditions so the stuff you're building just like the LA the lines being put in now the gas lines all of that y'all not watching nothing you're not watching how this stuff is going up and you don't care because you're letting people move and stuff that less than a year the mold is coming out of the wall the water is leaking already 350 units really with no Community input and so now your way around it to again slap the community in the face as you always do is to continue to have these meetings in the morning when you know the average NOA that works because we have no other choice in this city but to work to live here seven jobs you don't even have a hearing in the evening after six o'clock not one for anything because you know when the community comes out you're going to get it you're going to get the backlash you're going to get how we really feel so now you're putting up another building I'm sure you'll probably have them have private trash pickup whatever trash will that create is the fire department ready for a 350 unit building no they are not because they can't handle what we're doing now is the sewer department ready is the water department ready are we going to make sure that this building is up the cold cuz all the other ones aren't they don't have the bars on the windows for the children y'all not doing anything your legislators supposedly allegedly that's what you are your public servants allegedly that's what you are and you're not serving the public who's gonna be able to move it can even you guys qualify to get into this building or that's right you can because you got multiple salaries but the regular of us can't what median income are you using so that these apartments start at 80 90 and $130,000 who is that with your council salary y'all don't meet that your other salaries you do but what about the people that work for the city that' been here years don't even make 50 they don't qualify for none of this new stuff if people want to come here to build like they doing in other towns they're not giving away the store a community benefits agreement means okay you could build bu this but now we need 400 lowincome units how about that how about you advocate for the people who make Z to $100,000 a year having some place to live how about you do that how about you tell these folks that's coming in here that you're giving the store way too that they have to give back in the real way not into your pockets thank you for your comments next speaker good morning Council good morning the last two speakers you all know very well you know there are times when they come up they jump up and down hoop and holler and excuse me my name is jebra Smith Gregory um I serve as the president of the nework NAACP and that's the capacity that I'm here this morning and the other two speakers that came up and they talked to you now you know how both of them can be they can jump up and down they can hoop and holler and carry on there are always two sides to every story and we're asking the council to look at what's happening in the city from the lens of the community with the community benefits with the affordable housing but I I come to give you um a side of the story based on um with the NAACP as well as uh people's Organization for progress and the north Jersey uh black clergymen have been working on and that is University Hospital again two sides to every story you know the history so I'm not going to belabor that and use my time to speak to that but we have been meeting with the current CEO this Coalition um in the manner in which those two young ladies just met to talk about the issues in a calm practical way and we crafted a letter to CEO Jimenez m m Gregory M this this is going towards this one hearing for this uh development there was an opportunity for you to speak after the meeting at the end of the meeting to speak on any other issue that you would like to address okay then I will I will shift okay the idea of affordable housing and low-income housing and Community benefits is one that I would ask and petition this Council to have another meeting the central Ward residents do need to be included and as you know with social media there are so many ways to contact people you can't just do it one way when C councilman Silva had his meeting in the East Ward people came out because it was widely publicized my request is that you before you make a decision hear the community out the central Ward is key and crucial to the to the rebirth and Renaissance that is currently occurring in this city thank you for your comments uh next speaker no other speaker appearing public hearing is is now closed any comments questions from the council anything from the administration maybe just a a a quick recap of what we discussed last meeting let's keep order please good morning Council president council members Allison lad director of Economic and Housing Development uh thanks for the opportunity to speak on this item um I I wanted to uh do three things uh first uh just give a summary of the resolution that you're considering uh second uh discuss the project summary and then third let you know of the prior approvals that have been approved by the city council along with the planning and zoning boards so um first this resolution before you is for um Aspire Community benefits agreement the community benefits agreement is actually defined by the state law that allows for aspire to provide tax credits to projects throughout the state uh second uh the law does state that at least one hearing and Community engagement must take place um in order for the applicant to be eligible for the Aspire Ben benefits uh third um as a note there was um a community meeting as shared in July of 2024 and then also two years prior there were also Community meetings when the project first started uh to be developed the third part is is that the benefits that are listed for this project and that are necessary because there is not additional funding um from the city or the state um the county or philanthropic dollars are um important to our community um if we do not provide these benefits um in projects such as this there are times in which these benefits would not be provided the first is for art installation working with local artists um and this is an important part as we beautify our city and be proud of where we live um and where we work and it's important piece for us uh to have the ability to fund local artists and have them do beautification throughout the city the second item is um working with uh minority and women-led businesses and giving them an opportunity to um be part of the retail um and the activation in the city I think we all can agree that having retail that's affordable for our small businesses is difficult at times um and we want to have our small businesses our local and women-led businesses be able to not only uh be attracted to the city but to be retained and so this benefit really helps business growth um and small businesses um in nework the third one um is a sign that will say city of nework and we need a gateway to our city I think we have some signage throughout the city we have way fying signs but having a sign that also identifies our city of Newark to those that are passing through is an excellent way for us to market the city of Newark and we're excited about adding some additional demarcation um related to this project second topic um the summary of the project uh so this project um will be a 14-story residential building um it will have 350 Apartments 20% of those apartments will be affordable they not only follow inclusionary zon owning law but they also go deeper in affordability and their affordability levels will be below what's required by IO so we're really working to provide housing that's more affordable to our residents in addition this project will also need to use first dibs um the law that you passed recently whereby um new workers will get the 90 days exclusively to be able to tenant the units I can tell you in our experience thus far to date since that law was passed we found success in not only um city employees but New York residents being to access some of the new developments throughout the city in and in downtown um the third part is is that the project um total development cost is $15.5 million um and that was just the additional piece a few other elements of this project are that um the project will have prevailing wage uh for the construction of the project it'll also be complying with Green Building standards which is great for our environment and we'll have Union wage scale for the um operating engineers at the building in closing uh the prior project approvals um the site plan was approved in December of 2021 the resolution to support the Aspire application was approved by Council on April 26 six in 2022 so we knew that the project was going to apply for Aspire and we were grateful for the council's support then uh next the tax abatement the payment and L taxes was approved by Council on June 7th 2023 um and at that time um we could not negotiate Community benefits because they were not awarded so that's part of the reason why we're coming to you um later than when you considered the tax abatement is because the project didn't receive the award um until the end of the 2023 so we're hopeful as we move forward with the remaining projects that you'll be able to see the tax incentives if provided as well as the community benefits agreements at the same time so that it will alleviate perhaps some of the confusion around why we're doing this separately and um council president I'm happy to answer any additional questions thank you deputy mayor any question uh councilwoman Scott rry thank you uh president grum um I think at the last meeting I just spoke about community so we understand all of what you just explained um I think my my real question to you for the record for the public is when you had those Community meetings what's surrounds that Community we know housing the way you marketed the meeting let the people know because from what I my research there's not a lot of people in that community and I think that's more important to explain to the public we we aware of all of the benefits we're aware of the process that we followed we're aware of what we voted on but what has not yet been said to the public that there is no housing surrounding that development for you to have invited maybe the central Ward how how the public is explaining that Central ward has a stake and a say but the truth is how did you why have we not heard for the public that there the reason why there were only a few people there is not because you didn't Market the meeting or you didn't notify people of the meeting but because there's no people surrounding that development I mean if I'm not mistaken I think that's what the people want to hear like where were the people and why were they not invited uh thank you um council member rry and council president to council member rri's question um so this site is uh located on um orange and University um on the corner and when you go to that location it's currently a vacant uh piece of land um there is some parking that's at the site but the goal is to redevelop it and have no have um the larger uh Redevelopment project that we discussed uh second what surrounds this property predominantly is vacant Land There are some small businesses there uh there is some institutions um including Focus uh the nonprofits building is Right adjacent to the site uh there are Audible and Ruckers business school is across the street um and there's also other corporate office space um on Broad Street that would be in the immediate vicinity um we we understand that um Community engagement is such an important part of the mayor's Administration and we know that what the mayor has done in his 10 years is that he's worked to ensure that we have Community meetings um I think that's a real positive part of what we're trying to do and and we know that we may not reach everybody but we are doing our best to reach people that we can thank you councilman Kelly good morning how you doing uh Deputy Mayor um my question is if this was to go through and when they start developing will there be nkers on the site working will there be subcontractors from Newark will there be employment and if so do you know how many New Yorkers are promised or intended to work on this site uh yes uh council president council member Kelly's question um this project is subject to affirmative action and also for Source rules and so for Contracting and so that would have to be complied with for the project as far as the actual numbers I do not have those in front of me but as far as what they have to comply with they have to comply with both parts of the law thank you coun councilman canana yeah director Deputy Mayor I spoke to you about my concerns the focus entity of the developer never met with them uh the executive director stated to me that there was no conversation the building the project is right on the on the on the property lines mhm of focus so I would ask that there be a meeting with all with the focus because there's a programs running there while the construction is going there's going to be destruction I mean instruction and there's going to be a problem because there's services that are being rendered so again there was never a plan to discuss with them I'm not against Pro this project but I'm just concerned that the entity was never brought to the table and said look this is what we're going to do you're a neighbor but we're going to I'm going to put the fence here but you know what color is going to be it's different oh well how we're going to put the fence or we're going to put up but when you're do talking about a 14 story building and their concern is that you know one really talk to them about this matter so moving forward I think this needs to be if I knowing that this is going to go through that there'll be some communication with focus and and the community if you approve it but then that's called for a meeting so that the community can have some of those questions raised and we need to do so but we cannot We cannot put ourselves in a situation with blindfolds and say we don't know we we need to have a meeting I need a commitment that from you that you will talk to the developer and say look we'll host a meeting at focus with them and some questions so that there's some clarity here but there needs to be some clarity y because they were confused what happened at focus and councilman Gonzalez and Ramos would tell you uh there was negotiations prior to the executive director uh with Mr costum Maldonado who is not here who's deceased but the new director never had any knowledge of what took place so In fairness I would suggest I'm not against you know I'm supporting of labor labor is important hiring ners is important as councilman Kelly said but it's important too that that entity be given that right uh a meeting immediately so I I will put that on the table that's right council president to council member canan's uh question question um when the council member when you mentioned it to me I was surprised as well and also disappointed so um as far as your request uh we'd be happy to uh work to arrange a meeting between Focus um and the developer um I but again I am surprised considering their properties are adjacent to one another um and I will commit to you that that will occur by the way focus is the oldest nonprofit that started in the city of Newark with you C was the umbrella I'm going to just a little bit history here you focus came about because of that area nobody wanted to be there 60 years ago and the UCC uh black and brown Community together got together and UCC gave the funding to focus to open the storefront there so again there's a lot of things there there was some other develop should try to take the property from Focus you know and I was against that too because you just can't make us a dinosaur in a city because the the history of the city cannot just fall apart because developers have ideas they all the southern people found New York New Jersey on the map New York has been around a long time the 10th oldest city in America and you know now all of a sudden people are finding nework but look we got to remind ourselves that that those people that go to focus are the backbones of our community and there was struggles to get there with mayor Gibson who will help them get all that property at the time with UCC imunity Corporation who were together at the time there was a struggle for this so again I just don't want this to just go to the side and we forget that there was people who used the services there I understand the people are going to move there but there's focus is important to me that's right thank you understood council member thank you councilman uh Council councilman Gonzalez yes it's a there there has been some negotiations trying to get the the lot that Focus has and might there might be some bad blood between focus and the and the developer because Focus refus to sell the building to to the to the people making ER the development in the area so I I can see why there there has been no communication because there there was at one point in time the intention of buying the building that Focus has to have a full project in that corner and focus refus to to sell to to those individuals so maybe there is a a little bit of a let's say animosity among the parties and that's why the meeting hasn't occurred I I concurred that there should be a meeting ER so that the people that go to focus don't get affected they say the seniors that go there students that go there don't get affected by the building next to them but I believe that the meeting has not occurred because of what happened before I I I love when the miss you know who you are goes like this so you disrespect us and if we were to disrespect you we will have a problem do not do that to us do not disrespect you thank quiet any other speaker uh last comment last comment I concur with um councilman Quintana and and what um councilman Gonzalez is saying in the last meeting we stated that there would that was stated that there would be a community whatever that consist of those businesses and those nonprofits are the community I was speaking a residential but those small nonprofits of focus has been here before any of us sat in this seat and and to whether there's bad blood or not there got to be a conversation or we're disrespecting them by just building around them or over them without a conversation so someone has to spearhead all of those businesses being a part of a conversation before we just go up in there and start building I'm in agreement with the building I'm in agreement with the project but I'm not in agreement with passing something that is going to affect people that are in that community that have not had no type of conversation with those individuals that were there before they came here what C council president if I if I could I would just like to commit to um arranging the meeting personally um I am familiar with focus and the new executive director um we've had a good conversations over um you know during my tenure so I'm looking forward to reaching out to her to um convene meeting where it can be between you know our office as well as the development team as well as Focus um we would uh want to ensure that that happens um and you know second part is is that yes development conversations happen all the time and sometimes people choose to go different ways um and so I understand where council member Gonzalez is coming from but again we'd be happy to at least convene a meeting um and speak through it and I would think that the executive director of focus would welcome it if I reached out to her myself so I'll do that thank you with that uh roll call Council yes Gonzalez yes Kelly yes kintana yes Ramos yes Scott rry yes Silva yes president Clump yes [Music] public comment we are now in the public comment portion of this meeting where each speaker will have three minutes to speak if you have an item to address to the council please state your name for the record Lisa Parker respect is earned for the last 10 years under this Administration the lawlessness the corruption the non-accountability the fact that a councilman could talk about somebody should be respectful to you when you've done nothing as a body on that day but disrespect the people and the voices and have done nothing to address the issues and the concerns of the people that put you in those seats the same I'll say for all of you unions out out there that allow this Administration to disrespect contract language don't honor contract language to give people a living wage and benefits the same group of people all of you up there that go along with this affordable when half of the municipal workers rely on vouchers to pay their rent it is not affordable if you can cannot make 87 to $120,000 a year so let's stop the nonsense we heard the lies from this Administration when you told us there was no lead in the water listen up people out there we listened to the lies when you said you did a 100% pipe replacement and we're learning now you didn't do that and y'all said there was going to be an investigation so while you are up there talking about what respect looks like how about you start working for the people and stop doing these slide of hand deals their urgency to submit their application has nothing to do with the fact that they didn't engage the community you got to Aspire right now giving 11.5 million for a project for the same person that's involved in the pipe replacement Scandal so let's talk about who's advocating on behalf of the people respect is earned respect is earned all of you people sitting up there talking about you on your apparatus for certain reasons and whatever your Aid supposed to do that do the research before you get here half of y'all are up there don't even read what's in these ordinances let's get real and then you want to do the slide of hand thing and why I said that you asked the right questions Gonzalez but you always vote on it but you've done nothing in your tenure to help the people that need tax relief let's get real y'all are corrupt thank you for your comments next speaker good morning counsil members my name is fera Bradley I curently still reside at 200 George ging Village waiting my exit on 10524 as of 10:15 24 I have to vacate the premises at 200 George King Village by 4M I'm forever grateful I received a denial letter from exas County division of family assistant at 320 321 University Avenue in North New Jersey I was told to take the denial letter to Once in Williams Street forever grateful the stud Nork office of homeless prevention at once Williams Street North New New Jersey Room 112 Kyra wats Kyra watts and Courtney Derby has helped me to secure a unit I'm forever grateful so grateful thanks very helpful very professional good job I appreciate you I'm exing today I'm not finished I got to get through it I'm asking the counsel today Reverend Louise Scott Round Tree Crump Pat counsel and D pre please exped dat an emergency inspection on my unit on the property I have secured because I have nowhere to go I have no emotional support animal his name is Fluffy who has never been away from me he's 5 years old I also have nowhere to store my belongings um do you know where I can get the resources for a storage to store what I have left I'm in in on hard times for the moment building my case I'm forever grateful please can C help me to secure a storage unit and temporary shelter for me and my cat fluffy until my unit is complete thanks to my landlords now I want to thank the councilman at large Larry CL Walter Bryant dpre Kelly and my favorite I'm going to be just like you one day Reverend Lise Scott ramree I love you and appreciate you your help has not gone unnoticed I can't say the city north has not helped me because y'all d y help me trly I'm grateful District leader 13 year C thank you my bonus mother I love and appreciate you thanks for your guidance I'm up next stance I'm a walking testimony I will remain grateful through the long suffering I ask for forgiveness so I can remain using my superpowers my superpowers is forgiveness love Hope and Faith love is most important without love you don't got nothing a whole chapter on charity 1 Corinthians 13 the chapter of love my God I want to apologize for my Outburst inside the chambers of the city of North Council and disrespecting the chambers I will not do it again step back into my professional stage again I will articulate better and I'm coming for respectfully M's um I appreciate you thank you for your comments next speaker this this so n l Grabber new land grabber Allison lad we came before you and told her she she never does community engagement the right way in the city she never advertised she got we got Channel 78 we got Channel 19 we got uh y'all could do pamphlets the lady came here last week and said from James Street homeowners association that she haven't been invited to no meetings and she had haven't been invited to this meeting until the public uh the community showed her that there's a special meeting about this this is this is this criminal no other way to describe it criminal she back there shaking the developer hand oh yeah way to go we already know that they they uh pay to your campaigns and you don't care nothing about us cuz you don't there's no oversight there's no transparency and there's no accountability and nothing should roll through this city talking about the community and talking about housing for ners if you don't have that type of agreement from the community community benefits should be from the community period and the discussion that agreement and you sign the agreement and if you violate the agreement there will be penalties now on with this uh uh fail corrupt government this is the black near force during a baraka's Administration now listen at this the dome of City Hall in nework is painted gold but a crowd that rallied in front of the building Saturday proclaimed that the the administration of Mayor sharp James is hoarding all the gold for itself close to 125 of those demonstrators led by Baraka and the near Force this is what Baraka stated he uh laid out a laundry list of corrupt charges now you had the uh Corporation Council came up here oh we don't have corruption under our Administration now you got one went down last week another went down months ago and so still going down this is why we fight newers and this is why we get banned for meetings because we exposing them for what they are failures no other way to describe you that's what you are you ban me and Donna because we got posters on on uh Facebook calling us informants and then will somebody turn around and call your mayor informant which he is and inform it thank you for your comments next speaker you want to ban us from a me next [Music] speaker worry for the people you I think if I made this up I don't know if it would be as good this is crazy all of you the last meeting last week stood up for the people yeah we need a meeting there needs to be a community meeting how many people were at the community meeting two people oh that's unacceptable we can't vote on this but we already knew that there was going to be a text a phone call a meeting about something y'all were going to have to pass this and here we are a week later and every one of you that requested demanded Community involvement oh let me let me say this Allison L got up here with an attitude after we said what we said well it's not for the community this is between the developers and the City of newk so again I am n the people are NK the people are the city and you all that are supposed to be representing us and you sat here and got fake mad no this is unacceptable we're going to abstain not say no we're going to abstain and no it's not going to pass but then you had a meeting and you're back here and then you Bamboozled it to where those of us who spoke last time well let's put this wording in here and then we're going to tell them if they spoke they can't speak next what in the world you create it as you go you make it up as you go and then you bang your gavel within a seat that you should not even be in quiet quiet excuse me sir that is not how you address adults the constituents that pay your salary and you are in a seat that you did not earn you have not earned the respect of the people because you have not worked for we the people you sit up there with your head on your hand the same way you did in the corner over here the fact that they voted on you sitting in that seat you yourself should have had enough respect to say no I do not deserve to sit in the seat it should go to kentak the longest serving the highest vote getter I am the least experienced in this seat the least qualified I don't you should have been honest with yourself and not taking that seat and those of you who sat here and voted yes and and Gonzalez I always said this only once did you did you come through you'll give us all the reasons why it should not go through and you will agree with us and then vote Yes the sister stood up here and gave you the original document where the the city of newk the people benefited with 70% of the low Tom moderate income and didn't ask the question but what happened y'all don't care because like Allison said y'all don't do it for us you make the deals with the developers thank you for your comments next speaker h hello Council uh juwel Baskerville again I'm just a bit confused on what was the point of asking for Community feedback if you were just going to vote Yes um there are literally thousands of lowincome to medium income families waiting on these list and you just give us luxury apartments with 20% affordable and when I say affordable I don't mean affordable I mean like a studio for ,000 and that most likely does not include parking and I hope you don't have any pets yes um just moving forward I would really like to see the council look at what the people are saying and what they really need they need affordable housing we don't need no more luxury apartments they look nice yes they they have you know like pools and fitness centers but a community Community Center could do that too you know like we don't need thousands upon thousands of veganes and also I would like to know if like the veganes are available for the people to see because I would like to know how much space is being taken up that could have went to people who need to be housed um also just since I do have more time um as I said please pay attention to who these developers are you know do a little research real quick because this is the one of the largest black communities in New Jersey with three times the poverty rate and I think it's very important to know the beliefs of these developers and how they feel about lowincome people before they try to make a profit off of us so um thank you for your time and please think more of the people thank you for your comments next speaker [Music] quick question is there public comment during the special conference just wanted to know um one monitoring of construction sites you guys really got to get serious about this you have too many construction sites going on building Street all of that with no permits and y'all don't care we come to this mic and tell you what's going on I do my lives I know you had the police department monitoring my Facebook page no problem but when I do it come out how many more gas leaks y'all going to let happen before something serious happens here there are houses blowing up all over the state of New Jersey because the people who are doing this work are not qualified for it the W of last service lines it's not just Jazz group I've been talking about the incomplete and inaccurate work of these lines for four years almost I started it I've been championing it homeowners are calling me now thank you Donna but why you not checking Montana and why you not checking Roman's lines because they weren't done homeowners let me tell you something we are going to sue personally the municipal Council and the mayor because we have come before them and told them this work is not being completed so let me help you understand how we going to suit them go downstairs into your basement go to your water meter and when you do not have a brand new copper line going from your water meter to outside they did not complete the contract I have the 400 page contract you were supposed to do full service line replacement not the nonsense they doing in Irvington and not the nonsense they doing in East Orange we pay for full line replacement from the street to the house it did not happen at anybody's house now maybe seven people did get it done because I have a friend that lives in the East W she owns her home and it was done but not everybody else there's no no copper pipes in people's basement so it wasn't done so you're jumping on the little guy I get it because that makes y'all look like you're doing something but let's get Montana and let's get Roman and you still got out there doing work and make sure that their things are Inta why don't we have a monitor out there who is the person oh that's right we don't got nobody legally in no position so the workers aren't in position oh Jesus taxes can you explain to the public because they want to know especially the seniors what this $200 million increas is in this budget please expand it for 2024 and what's the increase going to look like for 2025 400 five y'all just whatever y'all want y'all just gonna do it right whatever the Boy tell y'all y'all gonna keep doing it landlord tenant court yesterday still got my seniors in there y'all is the worst letting these owners that are your friends and family cuz they ain't mine take these seniors 80 years and older to court for false charges and you're doing nothing thank thank you for your comments next speaker good morning uh councelor George Tillman Jr again we're going to come back this this this this issue that we're having um with the community with with these engagements and everything this is all has to come back to the same ordinance that oversees all of these economic incentives that same commission is responsible for the implementation of all these things that goes on on everything that goes on on these developments these Community outreaches are all supposed to be done as a part of these nework resident job policy office that is a part of that ordinance because each development each development is supposed to have a community engagement and Outreach everyone in every Ward that's why that job policy office that's a part of this ordinance that's not that's why you just can't do an amendment to the ordinance these components have to be placed a part of the government when the government is non-compliant this non-compliance that you see right here all these problems occur our community right now the construction that's going on in this city almost $5 billion do or more 50% of that $2.5 billion dollar is supposed to go back into our community nework residents are working so you can come up here and say you're doing all of this to enforce this to enforce that 2.5 billion dollars supposed to be going back into our community as I speak so why we have so much poverty why is there so much homelessness why is there so much joblessness going on in our city when these ordinances that we have to protect new residents aren't being enforced the government is non-compliant so you can come and continue to vote it's it's it's doing this very disrespectful to the residents because the government is non-compliant with the ordinance there is no New York Employment Commission that oversees all of the construction the reason why these developers these local developers that $10 million Hurt No when that fraud happened when these developers don't pay their tax abatement it hurts when they don't hire n resident it hurts so the government is responsible until we get the new Employment Commission and acted and doing its Duty overseeing these economic incentives this is going to continue and Mr President there's a responsibility that we have to the community to get this done immediately thank you thank you for your comments next speaker Mr President good morning morning Municipal Council CH colon morning um wanted to take a shift to a different matter I understand right now the current regulations that y'all have passed for the development we're going to come up here meeting after meeting but there's such a new framework right now there's almost a Floodgate Of development or a freefall of development happening it also affects our public health and the current agreement that we have with University hospital now we know that agreement was uh structured 50 years ago but my question Mr President Mr chair chairman is um what are the value of the assets land Building and Facilities prior to the Ruckers University merger and is this Council and city government prepared to leverage a larger and much broader discussion with uh University Hospital they're going to be taking on about $2 billion do in construction development for a new hospital and when I looked at the original agreement that was structured in April of 1968 I wasn't even born yet my mother was a sophomore in high school Mr President Crump that agreement was an agreement with not only the city of New York uh the state of New Jersey and also the federal government at the time uh LBJ was President we have now deviated so far away from that agreement where now the hospital is going to be merged with uh Robert Wood Johnson and um although I have seen some council members hold uh uh information on job uh hirings for the the hospital that is a good step but the the matter is much more it's much more comprehensive than just uh the hiring the shortterm hiring we want a partnership not only with the board of education but also uh the the local superintendent so that we can have a pipeline of talent uh from nor and also Essence County College to uh put kids on a path of a medical school and um that was kind of the general contents of my public commentary and that uh we find out what is the federal component that was involved with the original agreement in 1968 for the hospital because that hospital is not supposed to be uh merged or be subject to any uh Capital activity in the healthcare economy uh the nuances of healthc care have become uh much more taking on the nature of Wall Street deals but we want to um have n the City residents have a seat at the table um through this operating merge or whatever complex language they put around it we need a seat at the table and we want labor not only a active uh Community oversight board which we know that there is one but it's not really filled with members of the community so for as far as the north W South W East W Westward we all uh have talent that can go toward the hospital and thank you thank you for your comments next speaker seeing none public speaking is closed oh I'm sorry I'm sorry Miss uh Smith Gregory good morning again good morning do I have um no first let me introduce myself my name is jebra Smith Gregory and I'm here as the president of nework NAACP and I am I in the right category now for University Hospital you can speak on any matter uh Smith Gregory Miss Jackson Miss Jackson please she I already addressing her thank you you can speak on on any matter you'd like M so when I originally came up I was speaking about University hospital and I understand that the council will be given um a presentation by the CEO and when I've came up the first time I said that there are two sides to every story and I'm asking you to look at the presentation from from the CEO but to also hold on to the fact that the community has a side too and we are not here to be um adversarial or confrontational with you about this we know that University Hospital is very key and crucial not only to the city but to the entire State as the only public Hospital in the state of New Jersey level one trauma and we and as such we have the a we need to be stewards and strong caregivers and caretakers of this institution when we look at the people who are on the street who need Charity Care University Hospital is the only place that they're going to be able to go and so when the CEO gives his um presentation um I would ask that you think about the impact that what he's saying and what the community is saying because the community is going to give you the other side and we just really need you to listen to it for example the impact on the Stu on the patients from new the impact of uh a possible merge with Ruckers Robert Wood Johnson and uh Nork uh Beth excuse me University Hospital there was a time when there was a Cancer Center there was a liver Center and those out those Services were offered to our community they're no longer there and to what Chay CA just said about um construction and and employment we need I'm sorry M Miss smth Greer your time is up so what I would like to do is send this to you in writing that that would be great thank you thank you so much any additional speakers seeing none public speaking is now closed so I need to um let's move to adjourn oh I'm sorry forgive I'm jumping ahead of the guy first of all any comments from from the council seeing none Administration council president council members Eric Pennington business administrator thank you uh week after week and council meeting after council meeting uh which I attend about 99% of them we sit here and listen to comments from the audience which their right they have a First Amendment right to speak and this is the appropriate form for the speak uh they don't have a right to stand up here and make ad homm attacks that are just uh blatant lies and blatant distortions of what has taking place U many of the comments are intended to forment fear and anger and distrust uh without a basis in in fact and the first thing I want to talk about is uh very briefly is the lad service line replacement uh under the administration with the support of the council mayor Baraka led a uh National nationally renowned effort to replace 23,000 lead service lines at no cost to the individual taxpayers that program was extraordinarily successful uh the most recent test results have indicated that there are zero parts per billion of lead in the water uh when in fact um bottled water manufacturers are allowed to have up to five parts per billion uh so the norc water is significantly safer to drink than the water that councilman canana is drinking right now I understand fair enough fair enough I'm just telling you the north water is uh incredibly safe it has zero parts per billion the lead service line program has been an extraordinary success there was uh at least One Bad Apple who was uh investigated by the US attorney's office and the FBI and they have been charged we have an expectation that they're going to be found guilty every single service line that was identified by the US attorney the FBI and others as having potentially not been replaced properly has been fixed and corrected there were less than 35 lines that were ultimately identified out of 23,000 and they have all been fixed and all been replaced if uh any of the speakers have um identifiable information real information about any Resident that they want to bring and they don't want to call them out publicly and I understand that want to bring to my attention to the attention of the water and sewer director or council member we'll look into it and get it addressed but I don't think they have anything because they can stand up here and make bold boldfaced accusations without any uh credible evidence the same can be said for comments about the deputy mayor being a liar anybody can make that statement but there is no identifiable information that supports that uh she lies she comes up here every meeting and gives more detailed information factual information that can be fact checked than anybody including me she gives the council Advanced information it's available to the public every single property that comes up before this Council there's detailed information about why it may be less to councilman Gonzalez's Point why it may be less than the assessed value and that information comes up here so it's easy to call somebody a liar it's hard to back it up it is easy to say somebody is corrupt or fraudulent it's hard to back it up I've endured that myself I don't really care makes me no difference I know I'm not corrupt I know that I've done nothing wrong I don't have any evidence of facts that either the mayor or any council member is engaged in that either but these people have the right to come up here and make these crazy comments if they want to but they should be able they big and bad enough to make the comments be big and bad enough to talk about with some specificity what the proof is otherwise they're just empty shells of people making words that's coming out of their mouth there's a song out there that says I know you're lying because your lips are moving well that's what happens a lot of times with these folks up here they want to continue and open their mouth and say things that are unsupported by any truth go right ahead but all you're doing is making yourself look ridiculous that's all I have to say about that I'm here to I may councilman Gonzalez yes in view of what happened with the water replacement lines are we anticipating recovering the the $10 million that were paid that's right councilman Gonzalez the contractors at the primes and the subprimes have uh bonds they have performance bonds that each of them put up with will go after those bonds uh to recover the costs that the city has endured u in large measure because we uh dug up hundreds of uh test pits and lines to ensure that there was no problem because of allegations that came about uh from what some of these unscrupulous contractors did we're going to go after him we will get every penny that we were entitled to to get done and again I reiterate at a 23,000 lines there may have been one or two that we missed if anybody out here has some information about that bring it to our attention and we'll take care of that too but they will not because they will continue to stand up here and make falsehoods uh with no backup whatsoever so people in the audience I'm saying this for the people in the audience when you hear these unfounded accusations take it for what it's worth from where it comes from there's nothing that comes from them that supports any of these bald accusations about corruption lying or that the mayor is an informant there is no evidence to support that whatsoever other than what comes out of their mouths and as I say some people you know they're lying because their lips are moving have nothing else to say about that thank you Mr ba any any other comments from the council any questions for the ba I I will say this uh just with regards to Deputy Mayor lad I I do believe that she is always provided us with information and documentation in a very quick and meaningful manner to help us with our uh discussions and help us deal with um the development or anything else that's coming along and I've been to I would say probably close to dozens of meetings in the community that she has put together so um in each ward in every single Ward so you know I I would like to just say that publicly because I I think at times folks in the administration get beat up for doing for not doing things but I think she is one who is continuing to do what is necessary bringing the community involved in a lot of these matters Mr President yes uh councilman R yeah I I didn't want to belabor the point about the development on Orange Street but but I just feel like U just want to put my two cents and you know that project's been before us number of times it went through all the approvals through planning board um this is coming to us after the fact because the developer was able to get us you know the Aspire credits which which is a good thing because that means this project is going to be a prevailing wage project on the construction side that's something that we push for we don't always get that when it comes to the construction of um uh new housing in newc it does have the meet the 20% inclusionary zoning which is what the city ordinance requires um I I do agree that the the billboard may not have been the best community give back idea but I don't think that came from the developer uh I'm sure there was input from the council from the uh ward council person from the administration but you know at at this point like I said the Project's been before us a number of times and this is coming to us because they were able to get the Aspire credits but you know moving forward hopefully the administration can figure out a better process to um select more appropriate examples of community benefits you know and stuff that hopefully the people who live in that neighborhood or the organizations that surround some of these development projects can provide feedback for it that's it thank you Council Ramos councilman Silva yeah so just going back to what council Ramos was saying I'm not against the development I spoke up about at the last time uh I had two meetings in the east Ward which were probably 7030 70% of the residents from the East Ward and 30% from uh the rest of the city um I put it out there on social media I put it out there I announced it here uh at a meeting and I think that you know just saying that two people showed up or uh there's no residents around that area no that meeting should be opened up to everyone in the city to give um some type of opinion on what the community benefit should be at my meetings and I I just want to say this may be uh something for for the future when we ever cross this road again uh I had 60 70 people at both my meetings uh only because I opened it up for the entire city I just didn't post it for the residents of the East Ward and so I think it would benefit us if we would uh whoever that Ward councilman is or whatever that um that's that Aspira Community benefits going to be that that we open it up for residents of the entire city to show up and give their opinion not just you know uh two people who may live a few blocks away from there I think we should all have an input on a community benefit that's going to benefit the city of Newark thank you well said councilman Silva and councilman Ramos any other council members I believe with that we can move to a journ Council yes Gonzalez yes Kelly yes Pana yes Ramos yes Scott brry yes Silva yes president CR yes meeting adjourned council president council members we are at the special conference portion of this meeting where we have a presentation on the status of University Hospital master plan and Emergency Medical Services University Hospital thank you thank you appreciate it good morning everyone and Mr Council president's not here but thank you for the invitation to all the council members um and I do appreciate you inviting me back so I was here a couple of times and there are topics you're interested in and I want to be able to review those and there are topics that I think I've heard along the way that are probably worth sharing so thank you for this time um you have received some of these materials in advance so hopefully you've had the chance to review but I will spend a little bit of detailed time so on on these graphs lot of data top left something extraordinarily interesting is happening in our city top left represents the number of calls that our ambulances are responding to and when you look to the far right 2024 you'll see some asteris because what we did there was annualize it so we took partial year of data and said if this is the pattern for the rest of the year what might it look like and I think what you're seeing from after the pandemic till now is a dramatic increase in the number of 911 phone calls resulting in an ambulance um the numbers are staggering and so that's one thing to put on our radar on the far right um there is a nationally accepted way that when a phone call goes into 911 and the caller is talking to the dispatcher that it gets categorized they're called triage levels so these are the nationally accepted triage levels the purple would be deemed the most severe the green would be deemed the least severe and then you have the in between what I want to convey through this data is the following if we look at different snapshots in time so the first set of numbers represent as you can see there January February March of 2022 and you'll see the response times in that category you go one more column to the right now what you're looking at are the response times from January February March of 2023 you go one more to the right January February March of 2024 and then you go one more to the right I just wanted us to have some very current data so that data is July August September of just now and when you look across I think what you will find is substantial Improvement across all categories and when I came to you last one of the things we talked about was we were going to respond better in terms of time that we had put things in place that we imagined could get us better and I think some of you asked what were some of those things certainly it's more trucks so now let's look at the bottom left when we look at how we've been able to respond it is without question connected to have we put more trucks on the road that is connected to we need paramedics and EMTs to be on those trucks so when you look at the right graph you'll see we've hired a lot more people and so we have been intentional about hiring more people that we can put more trucks on the road um and it's not been in overnight for a lot of reasons and I'm sure everybody's tired of hearing supply chain but when we order an ambulance it takes between 14 and 20 months to get on the road and so that's why some of those things were in motion and why I was confident at the last meeting that things were coming because I knew orders were already placed I knew that we had a lot of activity in motion so um we are getting better but I think there's a dose of reality that comes with the numbers and I don't want to shy away from that dose of reality which is if it were me that had an injury or my loved one that was in crisis probably anything more than a minute is too much so I recognize as a human being that that's the reality that that it lives within every one of us my promise to you my promise to our city will be we're going to get better little by little we will continue to make progress and I think the data is very indicative of progress we would all agree that the data in 2022 was probably startling which is probably at a time when you started to really get involved and maybe even just before that so those days are behind us in a huge way as you can see the DAT has made substantial progress Mr President yes oh before the CEO moves on to the um I guess you're I'll to the construction um with with EMS I and I know we we had presentation some time ago from the cosos and Michaels and they purchased um ambulances that were supposed to be included um to deal with the you know unacceptable response time that that we had had in the past are are are those ambulances being deployed currently are they part of the dispatching system and if if so you know how is that going and if not why not sure um the answer is yes and no all at the same time um so we signed a memorandum of understanding in March with St Michaels uh between that time and July we called on them 68 times Well we called on them almost 200 68 times they participated um so they're they're in the mix the reason why I say no is since July they've been out of service so even if we needed them they're unavailable there is there is a practical Quirk about using St mics they're only available during the day and our Fleet and our residents need us 247 so there is a logistical quirkiness about their availability um so we welcome their participation which is why why we signed the memorandum of agreement um when they had a truck available we put them in the mix but as I said they haven't been available to us since July um so it's hard to have this in between activity um coupled with the only daytime hour activity you could imagine to deal with 110,000 calls having the predictability of trucks on the road and having the staff is a lot easier to manage than the periodic that we're with now so um we'll keep the conversation open um and thank you for the question yeah and Mr chair um May maybe somebody from the administration I know that the ba walked out but the Corp counsel um maybe we can get somebody from the health department to kind of follow up because what we've heard from the CEO of St Michaels doesn't represent and I'm not saying you're not correct right um his his complaint was that basically they're they're ambulance they made an investment in these new ambulances and that they're not being utilized because basically the person that controls the dispatch is University hospital um and you also have you know the control on the on of the uh of the drivers who who are responding and um they feel that in this system sometimes it may not be beneficial for ambulances outside of University Hospitals ambulances to be utilized because I I guess a lot of the patients that you're picking up may be going to University so I'm not trying to get into a debate here I'm just trying to make sure that if there are Vehicles available that would benefit the system um and and reduce the response time and we still get complaints periodically especially from senior buildings about how long it takes for an ambulance to respond that we are utilizing every asset available to us so that we can um make sure that we're dealing with these emergencies uh as quickly as possible so through your chair maybe uh the ba could assign you know the health director or someone that can investigate and then respond to the council about what's happening with this um system and the partnership with St Michaels thank you thank you councilman Ramos and also if we can get the clerk's office to provide that great thank you um so many of you helped us convene Community meetings over the last year and a half we called them Brick by Brick you may remember and those meetings were intended to be able to show um pictures of what the new campus might look like and the idea we that we had back then was before we got ourselves way down the road of figureing out what a new campus would look like let's get a lot of feedback so we got a lot of feedback it informed us tremendously and we are at the stage of now what do you do how do you move forward and I put a picture up here because it as we all know a Picture Tells a thousand words um many of you and I think many in of our community have their own opinion about these trailers that I circled in red I put the circle in red for one reason as it relates to what is the hopeful construction of our of our new campus which is is the only land available for us to be able to move things around to be able to build a new hospital building which is what we really need are where the trailers are and so anything that we discuss about building a new hospital building is completely limited from a calendar perspective as long as the trailers are still here and I'm sure while it's an eyes sore it probably doesn't surprise anybody that people work in those trailers and we've had to relocate them so on the right part of the slide back in the winter of 23 we had to figure out where would these people go work now most of those folks were office related staff Finance folks Human Resources folks some information technology folks so we we went on a hunt to where could we find basic office space that would rent Year bye so that gives us flexibility so we found office space downtown um as you can imagine no space was perfectly suited so we needed to go put in our own routers and our own Information Technology needs so we did that so that's what we so councilman Katana I think has a yeah I'm just very happy that this you know these buildings I remember on this Council about 30 some years ago meeting with Stanley Bergen I remember the late Donald Tucker and back then mayor sharp James telling that that was a temporary situation and it became a permanent and it was never we even went before the Board of Trustees of our back then councilman the lake councilman Tucker and Hank B is and members of council and and and councilman Branch who was the central board councilman saying look we want these this is Barracks want the barracks out to hear you uh Ed him menz saying that this is a new day well this is good because that has been a bad IDE store for um I know they did a good job with martinin cuz that Hospital's name was martinin back in the day it was a City Hospital in the history of it is in ' 68 and and and the agreements of working together but to find that this is going to be this ISO is going to be put away and to another time it's good for us to see that because I really really people came to New York we gave them tours of the UMDNJ they said why are those blue buildings when you have all this asset it's doing nothing again um I I I since you've been there I I think this is a new day and New View with your staff and hopefully this will be gone and I I want to see the day I can see the structure after 30 some years that I've been sitting on this Council thank you councilman Katana thank you uh and I won't belabor all the details you have it in front of you right now that there's a sequence there's a bunch of things that have to be done more things have to move out um and then when we're done moving out there's activity that needs to happens on the site the Eda is taking the lead on doing site testing so what's in the ground what's in the water all those details it all puts us on a pathway that sometime in the late summer early fall of 25 the trailers could be taken down and if that's the case then it sets up for late fall or winter that there could be pouring of concrete for new buildings so a year and three or four months from now it's possible and so now with this having Clarity we can get into some more rigid planning we can get into a process uh we can figure out an RFP key process that happens in the spring for who's going to build these things so it is premature to get into all those things because we need to get confident that the trailers can come down in late summer early fall at this point I am confident um the more we progress through this fall the more clear it becomes and once it becomes clear then we'll have a pathway um and and I I I'm a little sad that everything that we're talking about building is completely limited by these trailers coming down because this becomes the most important Domino but I'm also thrilled because I have online a site that says these are coming down and it is going to be the start of something fairly spectacular for the campus over nine years there's going to be nine years of activity because to build this hospital we have to get to this trailer come down we have to get building other kinds of replacement buildings then knocking down buildings before we get to building a hospital so I wanted to give you an update because many people do ask is anything really happening and I can assure you 200 people now work downtown that said um you made us move so the trailers can get knocked down I sure hope it's happening all righty the emergency department it is something something that many of you have talked about when I was here last we talked about it and some of you know a version of our emergency department because you spend a lot of time there and that's a picture on the left and then you look at this picture on the right and you say that's a nice little picture I mean that must be other hospitals in New Jersey or somewhere else so I'm here to let you know that a portion of our emergency department is going to look like they're right and it's going to look like they're right because we've engaged with figure out how to expand our emergency room you know it's not lost on me the comments that I get which some of you share with me and some of you hear on your own which is it's always full there or why does it take so long well it's always full not not only because it's busy but because the ER was built in the 70s for half the number of patients we see today and we never expanded through all these years amazing doctors and nurses saw many more patients without more real estate but they hired more doctors they hired more nurses equipment changed over the years you need more supplies right so you just put a lot more stuff in the same amount of real estate and so it actually is no wonder how it's full all the time and it's also then no surprise why things get backed up because you don't have room to get people in and out and when we first imagin this new campus rebuild we said you know what part of this needs to be at to at least double the size of the emergency room and I think everybody would agree great idea and I don't think anybody's will willing to wait nine years for the solution so we figured out a way to do expansion now not all of it as you can see on the bottom note there we're going to expand by 30% I think in the abstract if any one of us were told 30% of something was going to happen I think we would each individually say that's probably noticeable whatever it is and so it it really is one of these where we're cobbling space we're taking one thing and then taking another and making it together that's why it's a two-part process to get us this 30% expansion the first part gets done later this year and it will look like the right our residents in our community will finally get space that looks like what they deserve and by the time we're done with the second part not only will we have that space that looks like what people deserve but we'll have expanded space now that will buy us some time it's not the solution but it buys us the time to get through the rest of the whole master plan construction so that we can double at least double the size of the emergency department so I recognize it's one step forward it is not two steps back but it's not the full Leap Forward that we need to get to um we will as we progress through this renovation um we'll invite all of you to come visit we will have a a to the extent we can figure out patient privacy a bit of an open house for the community because I think it would people would benefit by seeing um that the space can be appropriate and then folks can have aspirations that as we make progress we'll make real deliberate progress the last time we met I also shared with you hiring information and at least one of you said make sure you keep hiring more locally so first I want to start with the left graph almost none of us in the healthcare industry can grab a magazine in our industry and read an article that doesn't say there's not enough nurses or that it's really hard to hire nurses and I think nationally that's a true statement but I'm going to share with you a unicor horn top left in May of last year we had 1886 nursing job vacancies if you went on to our website 186 by this September we're down to 14 there is no National Database where we can track to say that this is the best in the country but I offer you complete conjecture to tell you it probably is the best in the country so While others can't hire nurses University Hospital has been on a methodical pathway how do we do that how do we get those jobs filled we've done it a lot of ways but along the hiring path my commitment to you remained which is we're going to hire more locally top right if you look at a snapshot set of data so January 1st of 2020 January 1st of 21 jary 1st of 22 jary 1st of 23 January 1st of 24 then you say how many New York residents are employees of the hospital you'll see that from January 1st 23 to January 1st of 24 we increased nearly 8% of the workforce from Newark you'll see the note at the bottom of that in 2020 about 19% of the employees were from Newark by the most current data it's 21 a half and we keep making more and more progress now if we think that there has been a little bit of a of a suburban sprawl that people have moved to Irvington or east east Orange or orange so let's look at those areas as well nearly 9% of the workforce are from Orange East Orange Irvington Newark in 2012th about 30% of the workforce was from New York orange East Orange Irvington we're now up to about 35% so we keep hiring we will continue to do more hiring we've launched two very specific programs um councilwoman re rree helped us with our first event in a very focused way to help us bring in the clergy to bring people who need jobs we had our very first event ever it's about two weeks ago 199 people arrived it wasn't a normal job fair because a normal job fair as I show up I bring my resume if I have one I apply for a job maybe somebody interviews Me Maybe I hear about it this was different we did that for sure we held it at night when people are done with doing their normal Day stuff we provided dinner so they didn't have to run around and they were welcome to bring their family not only did we do the typical you can apply you can be interviewed we also did job counseling because there are some people that don't know how to do a resume there are some people that don't know how to interview there are some people that don't know what it means to show up to work on time show up to work on time and we were we did and we continue to do that kind of counseling for this kind of event we even had people educated on how to dress for an interview because the poor young man that showed up in shorts is probably going to be a good worker but that's not how you show up for an interview but we talk to him and we're going to help him so we're going to take this job fair mentality to another level which is what we started a few weeks ago it's also not lost on me the comment that we need to start younger and so most of you know the data when we look at the graduation rates across our city hospitals there's one that sticks out Westside High we started a program with Westside High because I want kids to choose us to work for than choose the streets so we started a program this summer the school helped us pick there's somebody who works there Captain Peppers Captain peppers I called them Sergeant Peppers the other day my apologies Captain Peppers helped us figure out or or helped us bring forward 12 students 12 Juniors those 12 Juniors come to uh those 12 juniors are promised a job when they graduate those 12 Juniors will become seniors and we'll have a new set of Juniors and those seniors will graduate and get a job at uh and my hope for some of them ideally all of them is that the job they get right out of high school is not the job that they have forever because I have employees that start out as housekeepers I just got a great story my chief of staff Dr hickey just gave me this wonderful story we have a young woman started out as a housekeeper just got a scholarship to go to nurs in school that's what I want for all these kids they're going to choose between the streets and a job and so we started this at Westside High now you may ask what about the high schools in my district the answer is probably but I have to figure things out first because Westside High is the first one it's a if in our world it's a pilot program let's make sure we get it right or at least as right as we can before we try another one let's learn from that one too and get that one right to and then keep going so this will be a very iterative process where we do more more and more um and it's really is our goal to hire more locally back to my slides though it's also been important to me to make sure that we are more and more hiring in a way that the workforce resembles the community it seems like it makes sense but do you have to be in intentional about it you have to be intentional about how you hire locally mentor and grow so bottom left data from 23 to 24 we increased the number of African-American employees by 25% bottom right we increased the number of employees of Latino employees by 26% we will continue to keep advancing the workforce and if you look at our management staff we've grown the number of leaders that are African-American from 23 to 24 by 15% we will keep advancing the cause of making sure that we resemble our community if you just look at the senior leaders two years ago three people were of color today it's six of us right when you double that's a big number doubling anything is a big number so I am I am pleased with progress we're making but we're not stopping we're going to keep advancing my last slide Primary Care many of you are aware several of you participated in the grand opening on Market Street it was something new for University Hospital we were finally leaving the campus as we know it and bringing care closer to the community so on Market Street as you know we're providing primary care we're providing walk-in care we can draw Labs but that's not ending there we are actively thinking about how do we do more in the community and so across the street you know the hospital was facing a r Aid um to dispel any rumors the hospital had nothing to do with Right Aid we didn't own it we didn't have any arrangements with them they just were their own people but they went out of business nationally so instead of letting that be whatever it's going to be we're talking to the landlord and we're probably going to put a clinic there because look at the bottom there the clinic volume keeps going up up and up and if we don't deal with Clinic availability in terms of Real Estate it's going to become like the ER where it gets too crowded and people wait too long so instead of letting this problem wait we're going to start trying to do it now so we'll take the right a and do something but we're also going to look at sites in all the wards we're going to try to figure out how do we get primary and walk-in care into the wards um because we need to for a lot of reasons including the ER volume so I went through a lot of information a lot of updates there are things you probably want to know other than this and uh Mr council president I thank you again for inviting me I happy to answer questions thank thank you questions from the council start let's start on the left with councilman Silva yes uh good morning Mr gines good to see you again um you gave us a lot of numbers here charart charts um is the hospital financially uh sustainable currently uh we broke even last year so so money came in equal to the money that went out um is that yes or no or well I think it's a long-term challenge right because when you can't produce excess Revenue then you can't keep reinvesting in your facility and you are relyant on the state to do that so it is sustainable but the reason we have this aged building that we have now and we need the state to really give us a lot to get it redone is because of that so it's sustainable but we're going to be like this in 50 years again if we're not mindful about trying to do different things um well the hospital remain a c care and Trauma one is that the plan to still continue that absolutely there is no plans to change anything about our service delivery uh the other question was there was never any presentation here in the East Ward I know there was a presentation in Kudos the councilman Council but regard what you're presenting today I just had to confirm on my staff there was never a presentation in East Ward is that the plan that you going into the wards to present whatever you're presenting here we do need to go back to the wards yes so right now we're in the midst of all of the the data Gathering we then present we we then come up with um illustrations sort of these cartoons and we go back to the wards so 100% we will make sure every ward has representation we reach out to every one of your offices to help us set up some of these um presentation discussions so 100% okay the last question is I have the most densely populated ward in the East Ward and basically you guys come down there once a month with a mamogram bus and I have to pull teeth to get it there is there any plans in the near future to have more engagement in the wards because once a month uh to me is not a good representation of University Hospital in the East Ward being that you have an ambulance service there on New York Avenue uh and you have a representative who I work closely with uh who does an amazing job uh but it's still difficult to get uh the services down there for the people I'm I'm hoping that in the near future very near future there's more going on between University Hospital and the East Ward yeah thank you for those comments and we are absolutely interactively looking at what more we can do in East Ward and how much more frequently so U as soon as we have some more clarity as to the options we will definitively engage with you and other members thank you councilman thank you brother president um brother president brother CEO um So currently I'm just going to just throw through things out councilman prep and I are working on a community meeting for the central board um for University to come I've been partnering with University now for quite a few years before I became councilwoman and now that I sit on the community advisory Council I made it very clear and I'm sure miss Jackson will appreciate this that they can't be in a community advisory Council if the community is not sharing their concerns and interests with us so while we host our little meetings um there needs to be more meetings like that with those individuals that sit on that Council to hear from the community that's number one um so I'm asking that at some point we'll have that discussion once we meet that we also bring the community into that meeting with those individuals that sit on the council um next uh in reference to the mamogram bus I know there's a process and I've been partnering with um the hospital to move it around we're having one October 29th we've done one in the cental ward I used to part with councilwoman mcgyver I believe that if any Ward wants to do this I'm sure they can reach out to miss Tippin and they'll bring it down there once a twice a month if you reach out so I think that University needs to send that information to all of the council people so that they'll know that the process of getting that that and it's not it's not a hard process it's just a matter of dates and availability so please tippens and brother president and those of you on the team make sure the council people get the same information that some of us have so they'll know that they can have their staff reach out give a couple of dates get it approved find a location because that then falls on us to find the location where the need is that that bus will fit and so that that part um other than that um I think it's also important that when we have these Community meetings because there are many organizations that are already meeting um I'm aware of people's Organization for Progress um NAACP and many other organizations are meeting concerning um issues that took place years ago before any of us were even there I know Senator Ron Rice LED um an initiative because they had major concerns back then over 50 years ago and I think some of those concerns have Arisen um and they want to make sure I don't think people understand the difference some do those who read and they know the difference between the merger with the because the Deans are calling me from the school which has nothing to do with what the hospital is doing so they're two separate operations which really need to be explained you know they're two separate operations they're still all University and ruers so how that's taking place is so concerned and just for the record I want to state that anything that that people are concerned about changing and this is for the public if you want to change something then that has to be brought to you and we need to start working on updating agreements because we can't stand on an agreement from 60 years ago because times have changed the neighborhood has changed the situations have changed the need has changed one thing did not change is that's a public hospital and we have to make sure that those Services I mean at one point they were talking about shutting down certain dep apartments and this just can't happen so while we're talking about building and upgrading which is much needed in the trauma and emergency department we also need to talk about how we have really studied the community because when I did see the presentation the very first time the needs that came from the community I was wondering what and I said this to you I said where did these needs come from because the needs that we have and that we need for that urban area is is far beyond a tree or a beauty salon you know there's some Child Care there's some things that need to be put in place and we learned that from covid so the people who sat in these meetings that came up with these ideas and I know the plan is well on the way in reference to decisions and how you're going to move forward with this development but it is so so important we do not want to be back here having conversations about community and participation and involvement and I know you've held multiple meetings which is how you came up with the plan and the the first place but going forward councilman Crump and I are working on the central Ward you've already um sou Southwood councilman Council has already held a meeting and I think there'll be more meetings I know councilman Kelly and um councelor and Silva will probably do the same thing and that is very important and the the marketing the signage the way we put this information out um just like they packed the house for councilman Council we need to make make sure that the community is aware but most importantly this cental Ward where this development is getting ready to take place because you're far away from all the money you need uh but it's much needed to upgrade our hospitals for even people that can't afford it should have the same care as what they do and go up to cooperman's up in Livingston and that is really important so I'm really in support of the upgrade I'm in support of the new development but more importantly I'm I want to make sure that not just me not just councilman Council but the community at large is aware of everything you're doing and last but not least and I'm putting this on the record we did hold that clergy campaign employment campaign there will be another one October 24th but data and I have to say this for the record data brother president is going to be important of who you already hired between the first campaign and the one that's coming up on the 24th so I'm looking for that report and I know Frank is working on it so thank you very much thank you brother president for allowing me to have these remarks you got it thank you thank you for all your comments I'll offer one thought just from the practicality of the calendar to get feedback because the trailers can't be knocked down for a year because we probably can't even think about building a brand new hospital for five or six years shame on us if we don't engage the community for feedback because goodness we have a lot of time councilman Kelly thank you thank you thank you for your service and all you do thank you council president uh good day uh president um I just want to thank you too for for keeping our young people engaged yes in the west W our people period our residents engage um you reach out you guys always reach out to me um to be involved in something that's going on um and that can include the residents and you also make sure that they eat dinner you know um but one of the things that I like is when you talk to me about the the getting the young people involved employment and to see it come to fruition with the Westside students is very very important I would love to see it become a Citywide initiative as well but uh those those students are excited and I'm excited to see see where where they go and then the next batch of students coming um so I thank you for that my my question too is I see that we're putting a lot of clinics um throughout the city some in the west W and and partnering with different clinics in the west W have those clinics having those clinics in the west W have they reduced the traffic that is coming into the emergency room you know I know the emergency room as we all know can can be chaotic at times um but with these clinics uh with the gkv as we call it that clinic um uh the CL going south FR Avenue that's inside of Speedway Avenue School um all of these clinics are they reducing the traffic that's coming into the emergency room so so far uh the only real data that was focused is on gkv um and um as you know some of the residents in there were specifically recommended to be interviewed to have housing there because they were housing unstable and they visited the ER a ton we're actually about to submit a paper for approval showing the dramatic impact of reducing their emergency room visits and their hospitalizations but we've only been open three months and not everybody in the west ward and uh part of the central Ward is aware that it's open and available to them so we're excited about the early results but it's a small magnitude to really see a huge impact on the ER because the ER is so big um but it gives me hope that we can keep doing this in the South Ward do this in the East Ward do this in the north Ward uh do a different one in the central Ward so I think there's a lot of promise to it but to your point we are seeing it but the numbers are small in comparison to how big the ER is thank you thank you councilman Council unless MZ uh first and foremost thank you for the presentation um and and looking at the the long range and short range goals of the perspectives of the hospital but first and foremost there are several things that I still think that we have to uh be able to deal with and engage one uh is around quality and efficient care right so we have to continue to ensure that that is being at the Forefront of the hospital's engagement um two is to strengthen the to belt around customer service right uh be it emergency room treatment Ambulatory Care treatment or staff and Personnel uh from some some information and concerns that uh was given uh also to uh continue to strategize around this response time as you talked about earlier to figure out how we work through that and engage to try to uh make sure that we continue to get this down and then the F uh fourth is around quick uh growth and uh movement as it relates to the emergency room right you you put it uh in a very um you know engaging light uh for the purpose the reason the rationale of the expansion and why the emergency room needs to be expanded and I believe that no one up here uh is in disagreement with you uh but to uh work to ensure uh that is Paramount um and and and making sure what happens and then just the notion around you know continued Community engagement um as you know one of the the you know leading pra places in the state of New Jersey and care to continue to do that so uh no one feels like they are on an island or not getting to care um about the resources and things that are happening and then um a real increased focus on executive level you know employment you know I know we talked about from two to six uh which is good but there really has to be uh an increased level of of Outreach resource recruitment around the executive level uh as it relates to uh African-American and Latino leadership uh down at the uh hospital I think that is important uh when we talk about Role Models mentorship uh View and perspective I believe that some of the work that you're doing on the ground now uh in terms of the engagement uh through uh the clergy affairs with the employment initiatives are are great uh the The Men's Health days and and other community engagement experiences uh that that you have I think is good um and I think it's more important that we try to expand it uh so that people can understand that uh not only uh do we represent a public or state hospital uh but the kind of care and compassion that comes out of that space um is important uh in what needs to happen and so I think you know these um you know um couple of pieces these six pieces we can continue to work and identify uh because we know long the too uh the the need to growth and expansion of what needs to happen with the totality of the dollar amount of the program uh in in terms of making sure that we create this whole campus atmosphere of care uh I think really needs to be the focus and conversation and definitely want to thank uh you and your team uh for coming out the uh the other night uh and giving uh some very uh intentional uh and specific information and guidance about where the hospital was going and also uh um you know to share you know in that evening how you are you know still in support of the uh you know 1968 agreement um and and that you know the the care and and compassion uh in which you're leading uh is important to where the city and his residents need to go so thank you thank you councilman Council and and uh I'm glad we're in alignment on the things we're making progress on and we will and I'm glad you mentioned the agreements because um I was fortunate 20 years ago to work here um and back then folks like senator Rice and others were not shy about sharing knowledge and information so my brain was filled with information back then and coming back it allows me to see it in a different light and and I think I'm also fortunate having grown up in Patterson it's not New York but it's an inner city and you see different different things when you grow up that way so thank you for your comments thank you all right let me let me just add a couple more comments uh first let me say I appreciate uh University Hospital and what you specifically are doing in the community you and and Brooke um have been very very very good and diligent about reaching out um and being involved in the community and listening to what the community has to say I mean the the Brick uh Brick by Brick was I think very uh good and very informative and taught a lot of people about what is going on in University hospital so I I just want to give you kudos for that U definitely um quick question and I don't know if you you said this in your presentation but What's the total number of employees at Universe hospital just under 4,000 4,000 all right and additional question was somebody said that there rumors that the nurses May strike is is is that no you know um so the are the the nurses contract expired on September 30th uh for reasons that predate me uh it's it's a pattern for University Hospital and nurses Union to continue negotiations past the expiration date um of the last four contracts the fastest one completed post expiration was five months later and the slowest one over the last four contracts was two years um based on all the progress that I've seen I'm extraordinarily optimistic that we will probably strike a record speed of getting this done um so we'll see how the next few days or few weeks pan out but I I think it'll be much faster than any of the other ones um and I think we'll figure out over the course of our next five or 10 years that we get into more of a pattern where they get done pretty quickly rather than having a five month or 24mth scenario so the union has definitively assured me there's no strike impending okay um and I think that's because we're optimistic and they're optimistic that we've made great progress all right sounds good with that being said thank you very much for your presentation looking forward to working with you some more in the community doing some great work for our city and our residents thank you so much thank you for inviting me and your team thank you for your team council president council member the final presentation today is regarding the New Jersey 211 partnership all right director ccil president do the short STW your last and it's 12 it'll be brief believe me um but but thank you council president council members uh Louis Valerio director of the mayor's office of homeless Services I'm here to talk briefly about the path home the tech service uh I will also be yielding uh some of my time to uh president uh of the Nork Alliance Evan Weiss who's been integral in in creating this new service so some background um December of 2022 uh the mayor released his comprehensive comprehensive strategic plan to end chronic homelessness in our city since then we have introduced several Services projects and initiatives uh that had really helped us drive uh this effort forward uh one of our strategy was to and is uh to reduce Street homelessness and I will say that I uh really excited to say that we are actually in a two-year downward Trend uh that's pretty significant for our city uh in order to do this we need Citywide collaboration it was emphasized by the mayor in our plan that means that it has to go beyond just the service providers we have to also tap on the public to help us uh so we thought of ways to engage the public we said maybe a hotline but maybe not because that takes a lot more work to make a call so we said why not texting right my mom is uh 70 actually I'm not going to say her age but my mom is older and uh does text I think we all text at this point uh so we said that texting would probably be an easy way to engage engag the public those folks that you know casually uh interact with these uh homelessness and housing systems uh so we we started researching to see how we can develop this we had no idea how to do it uh but we had a a conversation uh initially with NJ 211 and they happened to have this infrastructure on the Shelf they weren't even using it so we said to them hey why why not use this texting service to you know uh develop a uh a texting service to engage the public to serve the unsheltered population uh they thought it was a great idea uh we began to develop this texting service over the next several months uh and you know came with the final product which is the path home uh texting service so essentially what it is uh you know if you see someone that's in need on our streets that it's unsheltered uh you would text the word path well the two words path home to a55 d11 you will then be prompted for a very brief survey what we'll ask you for the description of the person the location of the person um and that texting that that information goes as soon as you press submit will immediately go to our street Outreach team who will then respond um I'm really happy to say that the mayor has invested more into Street Outreach uh we are going from just two teams earlier this year to seven teams 247 by the end of this year uh so this will be a really great way to complement the texting service uh since we did a soft launch four four months ago in June we've received a total of 106 text messages from the public from all over the city um and again that is the best way for us to tap the public to help us uh locate individuals that are in need of our services so we're really really excited about that uh the breakdown for those messages were uh 47 needed a little bit more information so we have to continue educating the public on how to use this tech service 36 our teams responded but could not locate the individual in 23 we actually did respond and offered services to the resident in need one thing that really makes this more unique and uh councilman Gonzalez would probably like this is that it was paid for zero dollars zero City dollars uh this was a truly a public private partnership against something that the mayor emphasizes uh we need to shoulder This Together uh to respond to homeless and city so we are grateful for our partners the nework alliance the Port nework Terminal container pnct and other partners who really helped us fund and develop this initiative uh and with that I can uh take any questions and also council president I did want to yield some of my time for uh Evan Weiss from the Nork Alliance to speak a little bit more about our partnership I'm sorry any questions for the director councilman councel yeah just want to uh make sure that we're putting out a uh Q&A around the uh path pathway home piece the 8551 number so that folks can have a frequently asked questions what happens what do you do when you call us number some of the simulat and what what you said so that it can be directed given out to Folks at Community meetings so that they can be able to understand the process right so although we're at 106 for the urgency and which sometimes folks come to the community meetings or even to Council meetings to say that we uh need to be doing more instituting more these numbers are relatively low and so what it indicates is that we probably have to have other measures and letting folks know that this is a number in context that you can be able to reach out to individuals of and based off of the data you just shown us to be able to have direct care direct service or have information about being able to get to the location but who did not want that kind of direct care because sometimes people feel like we can just go and pick people up off the street and take them to different locations which is not the case and so we want to be able to at least have a frequently asked questions about how do we handle this this is the number to call and what happens when you call this number so that that information can be expounded yes so no it's a great idea councilman coun so uh we we did have a Facebook live uh a few weeks ago with the mayor we have developed a FAQ which we will distribute in our communities I've actually attended uh Community councilman Kelly which I gave those flyers out um and yes we got to do more of marketing we're actually going to launch a a big marketing plan to get the word out uh and and get more folks involved so thank you for that thank you councilman Council councilman Silva good afternoon director um that facility on mberry Street what's going on with that what's the uh es imated time that that facility is going to be uh open again or open yeah so um right now we're in the design phase we are working with the architect firm to finish the design of of of the project uh so we're looking at winter of 2026 to open the facility so about a about a year uh whatever happened to that bus that we used to utilize there was a bus that was always parked near Peter Francisco Park to help um the homeless to help those homeless that are were addicted to something uh we had uh it was a bus that the police department had the director is not here now but that we used to utilize I haven't seen that in in in a while yeah I I think you're referring to the hope one one van the one yeah it's it it it makes its way around the city uh we actually just launched one ourselves uh which has a psychiatric nurse practitioner a licensed substit counselor social workers we were actually at um frisen neighborhood uh just a week ago where we saw six patients right the the the nurse saw six patients and actually called an ambulance for someone that was experiencing a heart attack so um I think we need to do more of those I'm I'm glad you brought that up um I think we need to expand bringing those services to the community um we we enjoy and and and are you know grateful for the brick and mortar facilities but I think we need to step out and and engage uh those residents as well so I think we're going to do more of that hope those sandwiches helped they did I had five no I didn't have anything no I'm just kidding thank you any other questions all right as as Mr Weiss comes up I have a quick question for actually two things number one I know p uh councilman Council talked about a flyer can you make sure you you's disseminate that to all of us the council members again and we can share it with the community I sure will and thank you number two in the last meeting that we had somebody had mentioned that uh Hotel Riviera had uh families in there is that true or not yeah there's no families there uh it's all single individuals yeah we would never house families and individuals together all right all right thank you thank you thank you for allowing me to clarify that thank you director thank you thank you all right Mr Weiss where's your bow tie I'm missing it's in my suit jacket I put it on tonight so don't worry and congratulations C thank you how are you doing today I'm well I'm going to be very brief because I think I'm the last speaker all um I really have to say is this is one of the best things I feel like we've been able to be a part of because it gives I give an example I was getting groceries at Whole Foods someone mentioned they were buying some fruit for someone experiencing homelessness outside and I told them about this service and they used it and I than the councilman council's Point um it's great that I can go around and talk about this but the point is to try to get this as in the community as possible that people know that this is something that's available and and that works so we can get those numbers where we want them um we stepped in because it's been a focus of our members um we've had support of University Hospital you know and much of the broader homelessness work but I view this is something that um we were able to provide funding for again with the help of the port the port newer Container Terminal but also we can move very quickly um this is something that we needed some a tool for as soon as possible and so that is another reason why we stepped into do this but I think just to end with the theme of it's an empowerment tool it gives people can sometimes feel they want to help they want to do something but don't know this is a very easy way whether you're you know a city worker you're a visitor you're going to NJ Pack you're doing something you're a resident you now have a tool to be part of the solution to the problem uh that we are all spending so much time to solve and that your leadership and all the boards and all over the city has helped us be as as the Director said a national leader in this so I'm happy to answer any questions if you like um but thank you again for your support on this it's again internationally renowned work on ending chronic homelessness in the city well thank thank you any questions from the council seeing none thank you very much thank you all and we are I don't know what's the word I was going to say closed want to thank everybody for attending today I hope everybody has a great day and we'll see you in uh two weeks I believe right thank you e e e e for