good evening everyone Welcome to the July 22nd Rivier city council meeting please rise to salute the flag Al to the flag flag the United States of America the for it stands Nation indivisible libery and justice for all roll call of the members councelor agenzio here here councelor janino here here councelor greo SAA here here councelor here here councelor hero here here councelor Kelly here here councel McKenna here here councel noeli is absent councelor sylvest here here Council zambuto here here and council president cogliano here here qum is present approval of the Journal of the regular meeting of June 24th calendar item number three Tom O'Brien CEO of hym will appear before the city council to provide an update on the development of seic downs good evening sir name and address for the record please good afternoon my name is Tom O'Brien um I'm a resident of Boston Massachusetts welcome thank you Mr President how would you like me to begin do you want me to kind of give an update or or what would be the best way to begin I could I'm happy to do that councilor McKenna thank you um so I invited you up here because um from newspaper articles that have been written in the past um it just said that one of the things that we were concerned um on as a council was uh the halt of your project which I know it's not true but I just we this is what we want to hear you know we want to hear about the articles that were written and we want to hear about your the progress of your um project sure thank you thank you councelor McKenna I'm happy to do that um and also happy to take questions from people if you'd like so um so let me start by saying a couple things um the article that was in the globe um as I think I I pointed out to many of you who I spoke to by phone the article uh in the globe itself if you read the body of the article it's almost exactly word for word of what I said when I appeared before you a month or or so ago um I can't explain how the newspaper business works but the but the the people who write the headlines for articles write a different headline than the people who actually are the writers of the article articles themselves so the headline didn't match up with anything that we said and it certainly doesn't match up with anything of how we're operating so let me just State more clearly uh absolutely that the entire project is moving forward I'm here accompanied by my partner Doug mans we have a whole team of people uh at hym who work on this project every single day we're advancing the project uh as actively and as aggressively as we possibly can if I can just use that to kind of as a jumping off point give a little bit of an update even to where I was a month or so ago with you so uh folks will remember um that we opened uh the the first group of units at the Amaya project we call Amaya the first building that's at Beachmont uh that building is about 475 units in total when complete the first group of units approximately about 190 units uh have been completed and are uh available for leasing we've uh leased over 50 units so if you step back on the 475 units just in the last few weeks that we've done some leasing uh We've leased over 10 % of the units so the leasing has gone very very well um there are people moving in there now so there are for the first time this you know abandoned horse racing track with the uh those that that site everybody remembers was the the site of the the horse barns for the first time there are people living there um which is really uh terrific for us we we feel great about that um so that building has continued to do very well the units the schedule of the delivery of those units continues uh so there are uh now um another chunk of units will be delivered uh toward the end of this summer and then the final chunk of units will be delivered uh in November of this year so the final uh group of units and uh the building uh you know will be fully fully available for leasing uh by Thanksgiving of of this year which we feel great about in addition to that um we did a tour last week with members of the of the Beachmont um Improvement Association thanks very much councelor McKenna for connecting us with the uh the the beach M Improvement Association and we uh did a a great tour with people watch them through the building I think people were really pleased with that we'll I would extend that invitation to everybody here uh together with whatever constituents or anybody you'd like we honestly we're happy to tour the building we're very proud of it we're really proud of the work that we've done and so we'd love I'd invite everybody to come uh to see the building with us a couple of quick things just if you've driven by you can see that the exterior um uh pieces of the kind of the open space in the hard space is still being completed the uh I would divide that into kind of two big pieces so one is The Hardscape that's immediately in front of the building uh kind of on the path toward um the MBTA station that piece of outdoor space should be delivered uh sometime in the next few weeks around the end of July so so we got nine days left I guess in July so you know sometime in the next two weeks and then the final piece which is the sort of tabl topping and the direct entrance into the MBTA that should be completed by the end of this summer um which is which is great uh the other uh key thing I would say is is an update on the retail we talked a lot about that there was a lot of interest in that among the beach M Improvement um uh folks and so we we did uh quite a bit of discussion and update on the retail there are nine slots approximately nine slots in that first building of the nine slots we have letters of intent out to uh uh retailers for each of those nine slots so a letter of intent is kind of the first step toward securing a lease of that group I would say uh a chunk of them probably three or four are advancing pretty quickly toward the lease stage the first of which hopefully we'll be able to announce you know sometime soon uh certainly I think before the end of the summer which we we feel really great about and that would be a combination of some food and ability for people to to eat out and and U um you know come to the building we're we're trying to remember our goal with the entire site is to take this abandoned horse racing track and make it a place that is popular for people to want to come to to be there so a we want them to live there we want everybody here to take advantage of the retail we want everybody here to take advantage of the open space we want it to be a very public place uh and in addition to that we want then to use that activity of bringing people to the site to create commercial activities so once we once we make this a place where people want to be a place where there's retail and open space and people living there then we feel comfortable we can make it a place where companies will want to be which will allow us to build the the commercial buildings which is you know the key objective that's why we do the music venue that's why we have you know all the different festivals that we do all the different things that we've we've tried to do to activate the site if I could now switch a little bit to the topic that we talked about last time which is the next building so the next building is another 475 units it's literally across the street now we built a new Street that's uh in front of Amaya so that's called Salt Street uh and so literally across the street from that is a site you can see it prepared and ready to go it's kind of fenced in uh for what we a building we call Portico that building also is 475 units also has first full of retail and fronts the the parks and all those pieces uh that building is designed and ready to go we've actually filed the building permit application with the uh building department here in the city and so that building literally is ready to go as we seek to get the financing lined up you recall that last time I um uh spent uh this session with you one of the key topics was we're working carefully with the members of The Building Trades unions to try and get costs lined up so that um we can help them meet their obligations under a project labor agreement that they signed with a general contractor on the site so we're working very carefully we've actually made some really good progress um we I feel really good about where we are on that uh and so we're close probably in the next couple of weeks to being able to come back and give a positive report on that uh we you know have had uh a number of I don't want to give too much away we've had a number of the individual Building Trades themselves line up with us and begin the process of of us uh being able to kind of uh make Awards generally uh and start the train moving on on that whole process in addition to that we'll need uh we'll probably be back before you to talk about um the implementation of a state infrastructure project uh infrastructure program I'm sorry that um uh that we can take advantage of to help us with that project as well more on that uh later I'm happy to to come back at some point in the future and talk that through um and then there's you know uh hopefully a a two-fold piece which hope to deliver for you uh this year one is a grand opening of that Amaya building which will happen in the fall and uh a groundbreaking for the next building the Portico building which will also uh we expect will happen in the fall as well those are the big updates for me I have some other pieces that we work ahead on but honestly we're just not ready to announce those yet but um uh but you know let me assure you counselor as I said I think publicly to The rier Advocate uh the headline of that article in the globe was just not correct the body of the article matched up with what I just said about trying to line up costs and trying to get ourselves uh ready to go for that project um but um the other pieces are moving ahead and we feel really good about the prospects of the site same way we did can I add one other quick thing I'm sorry Council McKenna one other point I I tried to make a number of times and I I I said it when I was here before people should understand that at this point the combination of the work that we've done on the site all the infrastructure that we've built so far that new building that we built uh the investor group including us have put about $600 million into the site so over a half a billion dollars into the site and um to us what that means is nobody's walking away from this thing this is we're working very hard every single day the objective is to move it at a fast pace um but it's a big site and over the course of a 15year buildout there will be recessions and unfortunately right now in the last 18 months or so the real estate uh business is in recession um so we're working our way through it this is probably the fourth recession I've had in my career and you know the the one thing I can tell you every time I've experienced the recession the world has come back out the other side the United States has continued to be the great country that it is and we work our way back into building these projects so with that I'm happy to answer questions or anything that people may have thank you councelor Kelly thank you Mr President uh good evening Mr O'Brien so I just want to clarify so phase one and the 1 R extension consists of total of eight buildings one of the eight has been completed so far the building that you just mentioned that's correct you have a foundation permit ped for the biolab and another building what you just mentioned correct the building that you said so I have to go back and I'll have to go back and tally up what what we identified as Phase 1 R I'm not sure if there are eight building in that or not but I'll I'll I'll I'll stipulate that if you if you've read that from the the plan that may be correct we did uh pull a foundation permit for uh uh a building that is next to Amaya which would be a Life Sciences building if I could just describe it that way counselor that's what uh that's what these are could be a combination of academic and and uh and research related use as well as some manufacturing uh in that building we actually dug the hole and started the foundation uh we uh I would say toward the end of 22 in the beginning of 23 when it became clear that interest rates were going to go up like the entire Market in uh greater Boston we paused that building good news is we completed the design uh We've invested a ton of money in that building and that's ready to go when the market gets better that's ready to go okay that would be can I just make a one quick statement um counselor that would be the first time I think in the history of this city that a building of that size and that scale and that potential commercial tax payment would ever be built in the city and we would be proud to take that on right from well from what I understand and I I went back and looked at a lot of the presentations that were done initially and from looking at those it was my understanding that um the biolab was really going to be somewhat of an anchor for this development and my concern is that the market for biolabs has at this point basically tanked for instance that Boston Globe article did mention the Newton Riverside biolab project which has been on hold since 2022 and I'm also aware of another biolab on Rutherford AV in Charlestown that is close to completion but will be sitting empty without a tenant so in light of all of this the biolab is on pause for right now but when you begin to build that biolab again and when we're out of this are you going to do you intend to build it as originally planned or will that be somewhat modified or again councelor I would refer to the building as a life science building that's you know these are buildings in which uh some of the the life-changing uh drugs and treatments are are currently being created for people who are uh survivors of cancer for people who are uh survivors of all kinds of of different disorders uh this is an amazing thing and for us in in Boston I've been around long enough counselor to know that in the very beginning that that business started in uh Kendall Square in MIT and it was really headquartered around MIT and for many years for a long time those companies would not be located any place else suddenly in the last I would say 5 to 10 years those companies decided that they could be located elsewhere and so they went to places like Watertown they went to places like Lexington they went to places uh like alustin and we looked at it and we said why not rever why not rever why can't these jobs why can't this commercial tax revenue why can't that come to this city there's nothing wrong with that from our perspective and so but unfortunately it's on pause now because the market for it is not because all those communities are seeing their projects on pause but we're prepared Council if I could just finish this one thing we're prepared to take on that project again it's not I wouldn't say that that's the Keystone or however you refer to it the key to the site as I said to you is to make this a place where people want to live come to a concert come to a meal because that's what then is going to make it a campus for these life science companies that's where they want to be okay thank you young employees want to be in these places that are fun interesting exciting places and we're going to create that and I understand I mean to me after viewing the in touring the site on my own um I can understand why the Globe article was written because when I drove the site a couple of times during the week I didn't see any large excavators digging New Foundations I didn't see any large dump trucks moving material I didn't see any concrete trucks delivering concrete uh the only thing I saw was one large excavator which was parked two medium uh size frontend loaders which were also parked and the only work I observed was the finishing touches being done on the existing Amaya building so I can understand why someone would get that impression that there's no work going on there because I myself went by the site two different times during the week and didn't see any myself well that's because counselor as I've said now the second time we're trying to get the second building underway as I pointed out that building as you know we've completed the the streets we've spent tens of millions of dollars on infrastructure on the site okay so the fact that you could drive down a road if I could just point out that road is a completed Road together with all of the below-grade materials that make it a completed Road water sewer electrical everything else that makes that a completed road we built that road it's not just a it's not just a temporary road that will be the permanent road so we built that road ready to go we've fenced in that site we've labeled it I think we have a sign on it that says Portico okay and we're tring trying to get to a point where we can get to a groundbreaking if we can get the cost lined up we have a plan that will allow us to get that building underway and then we'll have a ton of trucks on the site and I would invite you to come back anytime you want to come visit by the way counselor I'm happy to meet you and point out all these things you know directly with you I appreciate that thank you and I I almost and I don't know you may have said this yourself I'm not sure but I think it's pretty much common knowledge and it's fair to say that since covid construction materials um costs for the construction materials have increased by approximately 30 to 40% and the Boston Globe article stated that you need to keep cost per unit to around 350,000 in order to secure a deal with your investors in order to meet that goal you are working to simplify architecture and cut back on amenities so is it fair to say then that these residential units will not be the original upscale residential units that were initially discussed and presented to the city I would invite you counselor to come see the Maya building with us we built that building we're very proud of it well future buildings can I just finish it's a beautiful building the design for the next building is better than that design okay it's going to have different sets of it's it come come see it with me has know that I'm just curious as to why you would say you were simplifying architecture and cutting back on amenities if that's the case I I don't think I said I'm not sure where you read that in the globe that's in the Globe article yeah so the globe wrote that but I'm I'm not that's not what I said okay there might be somebody else in that Globe article the thing I pointed out to you coun when we spoke on the phone is I have the the person who writes that material counselor is writing it from a variety of different conversations there might be other people who are cutting amenities there might be other people who are doing you know that sort of thing but for us what we're trying to do is to make this a very special site so the task for us is you're right there is a structural cost issue in our market right now the cost of materials has gone up by about 30% that's probably about right the cost of Labor has gone up by you know x% that's probably about right I would say the mixture of materials and labor represents about 2third of the cost of building a building like this at the end of the day so we're trying to work on can we take a different approach can we can the Building Trades work with us to live up to their uh what they committed to in the uh the in the project labor agreement can we pre-b materials can we pre-build materials is there a way that we can take advantage of the size of the site that's what we're working on right now okay and then um lastly the Boston Globe article mentioned that U Mass housing may be creating a momentum fund that would be used to help fund mixed income housing developments the proposal is actually included in the housing Bond bill before the legislature at this time it's proposing approximately $300 million for the fund do you intend in any point in time or do you foresee this development Ever Changing to a mixed income housing development in order to be a recipient of these funds no if that bill passes never you don't ever see that happening I mean never is a big word counselor um but I don't anticipate that no you don't what's been permanent is a as a project this Council this body we spent um two years with this body working our way through the process and there were two important things that the Council made clear to us one is the council said we're okay with you producing residential units to bring people to the site but we want that to happen from the perspective of trying to create commercial buildings that was the first and most important thing that the council said to us the second thing the council said to us was we want to make sure that these units are going to be market rate units and so we permited this project with those two pieces in mind so 50% of the project is for market rate units 50% is for commercial space hotels retail and the like uh in commercial buildings and that's what's been permitted and that's what we're going to build okay was was there any type of a performance Clause that you entered into with the city I'm not sure what that would be what do you mean a performance clause in terms of you know percentages of work completed by certain dates yeah I I mean I I think councelor basically there are there are pieces that are linked together so for example when we you know we build x amount of residential then uh we must have started why amount of of commercial I'm happy to kind of what as i' as I've offered a couple times counselor I'm happy to meet with you happy to sit with you happy to walk you through all these different pieces I've done that with a lot of the other members here so I'm happy to kind of walk you through that if you'd like thank you all set thank you Mr President thank you counselor councelor sylvestri thank you Mr Mr chairman thanks Tom for coming up tonight um and um you know the the article was was very you know it hit everyone like it should you know it was very worrisome um and and I actually spoke with uh members of the M Union trades throughout the past week um some very excited about the progress that has been made and look up to working with you and and moving forward um I I guess the towards the line of questioning what what councilor Kelly suggested in the big number in the the um article was was 10,000 units will not be built is there any truth to that no I mean we we we permited this we you know we we knew what we're getting into um we believe that the demand is out there certainly for 10,000 units of of housing the one one thing I would say uh counselor is um we feel really good you know one of the things that that happened uh in the month of March I think it was March or April um was we changed General Contractors and I sort of reported that to you folks um and so the general contractor that we're working right now suff at construction uh has been terrific they worked very hard and what we needed was a datadriven process we need a group of people who would work with us and walk through uh and put to a spreadsheet you know exactly what we needed each of the individual Building Trades U to you know to match up with and we have that and so that has allowed us to make progress us and you know I think remember part of what we're doing here part of the premise about that whole thing this is really an exciting premise I apologize if I'm turning too too far this way but the the exciting premise here was none of the buildings that have been built in R residential buildings that have been built in R have been built on a holy Union basis and and our our premise is we think this is a city in which U the unions can fight for and build these buildings and what needs to happen is is um the pi needs to be expanded and we can do that by creating uh kind of a residential approach and a residential rate and a residential set of work rules that will allow more residents of rever more younger people to be part of the Building Trades to be you know to be part of this and we're expanding the pie so that we can make it possible for projects that are built in Everett that are built in rev for those to be built on a union basis which is how they're built in Boston but somehow that you know doesn't extend across the border to rever so that's that's our objective to to make this happen that's what we're trying to do and we you know it's taken a lot of work but we believe in it it's a it's something uh it's a principle that we that's how we started this whole process and that's why we want to get there and that's I think there are a group of leaders who really want to make that happen with us which we're excited about absolutely and and just and with that then we can roll and we can build 10,000 units of housing I'm sorry counselor no no problem I I appreciate it and um just one more with the uh the jobs in in in with the unions if you could please just try to to ensure that that they're reaching out to R labor as well and and making sure rever residents are on that site because I think that was a big piece that that we were looking for and we want to make sure our residents are getting on that site as well yeah you may remember councelor we did a number of job fairs um beginning in 22 I think 21 or 22 and um uh we actually from the job fairs we were able to we we had great turnout at these job remember people would came you some of you here have been to these job fars thanks Council mck I mean so so we get great turnout from uh rever residents uh particularly young people who um you know were looking for a new opportunity some a different direction in life you know whatever that is we we were very careful to sign those people up and some of those people worked on the Amaya project I mean it was I mean they already on site you know working on that project so that's that's exactly how we're trying to make this work is connect people in get them uh trained get them on the the job it's a great path a great career path thank you Tom and I I think it's it's up to us as well you know so whatever we can do to help to move this project along you know we got to do this as a team to make it work in our city so I really welcome that councel that's kind of you know that's my major theme is please come visit you know whatever I can do to help you with all the things that you're uh pressed um but you know I'd love to tell you what we're doing it's it's exciting thank you counselor counselor zambo thank you Mr President uh thank you Tom for being here tonight um I am the longest serving City councelor in this room tonight so and I say that because I want to go over some history history of your project um everybody knows I'm a cheerleader for this project and I say publicly that this is the best development the city of Ria is ever going to get so now I want to go back to the original proposal um now before I do that there's a lot of talk about 10,000 units and I don't want my residents of rier to be scared for 10,000 units I think the maximum is 2500 in rever is that correct so the number in rev I think is 20 yeah yes correct okay I just want that all publicly because every time I read an article it's 10 ,000 uh units and and everybody thinks that means rier and that in simplest terms when we started the process Rivier wanted more commercial space less residential Boston wanted more residential and more and less commercial I know that and I'm getting to that because I was proud of that obviously and and I was thrilled that we ended up on a deal that we were going to get 50% commercial yes now I want to go back on a little more history here the original project did not include life science is that correct well I think yeah that's correct it might have in your head but I'm saying the proposal that was put before the city council it wasn't the anchor of of the project was not lify can I explain it real quick go ahead just so first of all it's not the anchor of the project if I could but the when we when we purchased the site in 2017 the market was sort of a fast moving market and and forgive me but it was probably my sort of the way I was grounded in this business I came up to the business knowing that life science building life science companies wanted to be in Kendall Square that's where they and and honestly remember when we started this we were the developers of what's now called Cambridge Crossing it was then called North Point when we bought that in 2010 we couldn't get any of those companies to come even out of Kendall Square as close as that is to East Cambridge they wouldn't come they thought it was too far to come to us at North Point right so we looked at it and we said I'm just not sure we're going to get somebody you know at suff Downs honestly just being completely direct on this but as the world evolved and as these companies started to go to Watertown as they started to go to all we built the building in in in Austin that set this all in motion with the New Balance campus we did we developed that building together with the Bruins practice facility which was way more fun to work on that than the life science building but the um so we did all that work and as we did that we realized you know what this is possible for rier and and I you know respectfully if I can to anybody who's listening to this this would be huge for reier for us get you know a Fortune 500 life science company companies like fizer what the the project I just described for you at at North Point okay we couldn't get anybody to come over and even look they wouldn't even visit the site today sopi North America is based at North Point they're they're based at that site that we put together and so Doug and I and our team we looked at one another and said this is possible for R we could make this happen it would produce a tremendous amount of value a tremendous amount of commercial tax revenue and great jobs these are jobs the other thing I if I could just point out people need to understand I know that there's a lot of talk about the phds and the people who actually do the science but the basic jobs of the people who develop this this work these are for the most part high school graduates who then earn a certificate in this work so they put on a lab coat and all the rest of it but these are people who don't necessarily need a college degree they just need to be certified as lab technicians and those people then get paid 75 80 90 $100,000 this is these are great jobs and and honestly for us as if I could just one more thing for us as a region there are other regions in the country that would love to steal these jobs from us North Carolina would love to steal these jobs from us they're working at it right now California would love to steal these jobs for us and this site suff Downs is going to play a role in helping to to hold on to these jobs and to hold on to these companies and so we're proud to to be part of that and and honestly I'll defend it you know in any conversation counselor great I you but the bottom line is that uh uh it couldn't be a better site for something like that with the transportation the blue line I mean these are things that people Overlook and and uh cuz those employees are young people and they're they're young people that's exactly what we're trying to do those young people they want to go to what's a fun restaurant what's a cool place to be how about a cool outdoor concert venue how about a cool you know and those people then go home and they or go to work and they talk to their boss and they say hey have you guys ever thought about being located at suff downs and that's how we make those transactions work okay just thanks for the leeway Mr President I won't go on forever here um can you explain what a project labor agreement is sure because a lot of people are confused about that and and uh I heard I heard mention of a uh a performance bond I look at a project labor agreement as a performance bond that the contractor is going to deliver uh what they're supposed to deliver and that's the commitment you make by spending more money to have a project labor agreement because there's not a lot people don't enter into a lot of project labor agreements uh at least they didn't uh in the years I was in construction because of uh the cost and in in the commitment it takes to do that so if you could explain that to the audience so they'll know what what it is and what it is when it isn't match y Mo most private projects don't have project labor agreements that's correct I agree so U but what our objectives were were uh two or threefold the first is uh we wanted predictability in the project so we as a company uh pretty much everything that we've developed as a company everything we've built as a company has been built with the U the Boston Building Trades even in Cambridge when we built our buildings in Cambridge at the North Point site which wasn't technically part of the Union you know sort of trade area we built a project you know while right across the street there were other developers who built non-union projects we built Union projects that's how we've always built it because what we get from that is the predictability of trained people members of men and women of the Building Trades who show up on site they understand safety they understand you know how to operate in a a safe Manner and predictable manner all those things that's we like that okay in addition to that that has also helped us build relationships with Union Pension funds that have been investors in our projects which is another you know key piece for us what this particular project labor agreement this particular project labor agreement was signed by uh the contractor for us um at the beginning of this uh John morard uh in Associates uh and all the members of the building tra so all I think it's 28 different uh members of of the Building Trades every single one of them signed that that uh project labor agreement and they were you know again two or three different pieces to it one is there's a no strike Clause so again we get the predictability once once we build the building once we get going with the building we want to be able to build it you know on schedule so there's a no strike Clause um there's a a clause that says uh the uh the expectation is that the trades will find their way either through the establishment of a residential rate or the use of uh other Union funds will help us get to a cost that is fin makes the project financeable that's the other uh key piece and in addition to that we together with the trades this is the third key piece would work together to expand the opportunities for new Young you know newer young people to join the trades particularly residents of Rivier particularly residents of East Boston particularly uh young women and people of color those were those were key objectives for us um to make that happen and so the the project labor agreement was signed five years ago between the that general contractor and all of the unions unfortunately you know in the five years the financing environment was was pretty friendly and so people didn't really push to you know achieve all those objectives now the financing enironment is much more difficult and so we need people to meet their obligations that they agreed to on the on the project labor agreement that's pretty much it thank you very much thanks for your time thank you thank you counselor councelor Gino SAA thank you Mr President hi Tom thank you for coming again I just have one question um are there still plans for an indoor concert venue entertainment venue like concerts and and shows and stuff like that we don't really have formal plans for an indoor concert venue we like we love the outdoor concert venue that's been a a big success so we're really happy with that we do think that music will play a role so there'll be could there be an indoor concert venue not sure what size it would be but we definitely think music will be a theme and will play a role in the success of the site it's it's been great with attracting people almost every single one of these shows that we've had has sold out there's 8,500 people so we're really happy about that okay thank you thank you Council thank you counselor councelor H thank you Mr President Mr O'Brien thanks so much for being here tonight um as you can probably tell once the article hit our phones kind of blew up people would ask us on the street people would text us about the um the future of the site but hearing you here tonight and how confident you are with the project is is a great thing for us um my big thing with r is sometimes we always have to look outside of the city to go to things like you know assembly roow Linfield market place we have to go to lynfield to go bowling you know movie theater we used to have a great movie theater for years and years that's gone so we have to go to other cities and towns to visit the movie theater but um I'm excited to see what retail spots and entertainment um Outlets open up there thank you is there any um any timeline on when you could announce what restaurants or companies are looking we're hoping we're close in the next number of weeks to being able to announce the the first one and uh and then they have to build them out so we'd have them built out you know sometime with the winter into next spring to get them you know fully open they have to build out their spaces and the thing the the one thing I would say is Council McKenna from the very first meeting said you know we want we the same just as you said councelor H that you know the idea is um rather than having to go outside the city can we make this a place where there are restaurants where there where people can enjoy the open space can be there you know it's it's um it it takes a lot of effort a lot of work um but we've been putting that working and we've done this before so we we you know we're excited to be able to be able to deliver these pieces but that's our objective is to make it a place where people want to be great thank you thank you councelor thank you counselor anyone else wishing to ask questions Tom thank you for being here tonight thank you for understanding the importance of this project and what it means to the community thanks for always being willing to come up here thank you councel place on file calendar item number four motion presented by council president cogliandro that the mayor chief of police and DPW superintendent will appear before the city council to discuss the growing problem with vehicles speeding throughout the city enforcement of traffic laws issuance of violations and speedom measures such as speed tables permission to speak from the chair thank you uh I filed this motion uh for the many many many residents who call us or communicate with us about speeding issues uh traffic violations and just overall Public Safety with all of our the vehicles on the road I want to thank the chief uh the mayor the city planner the engineer and the superintendent of the DPW for being here um I'm not sure who would like to come up first looks like the chief cahan thank you very much good evening council is good evening Chief we here tonight to talk about some traffic related issues and I'll be honest that's a number one complaint that we get is speeding Vehicles the way people drive things like that and uh it's very challenging for us and I would say since Co it's been a major complaint throughout the state I I've spoken to other departments the state police and it's like we're trying to get back in gear to where things were prior to co so our numbers were off they were down there was almost zero traffic enforcement for over like a year and a half unless it was some significant incident but one things that did go up during that time single vehicle accidents and they were doing a substantial amount of damage because not a lot of people on the road there wasn't a lot of enforcement and you had people driving uh careless and and recklessly so since then we're trying to pick our numbers up and we're trying to do some other things Thinking Out of the Box a little bit we have some speed trailers I can talk about that in a moment and the knows very well about those he was uh masterful with them and we've done some other things in conjunction with the DPW and other City entities and Partnerships where we're looking at other ways to slow traffic we've been doing things with uh and they can speak about it because I don't know a lot about it uh almost like speed bumps but they humps they're traffic calming measures we've been utilizing those and they they can only be in selected areas and like I said they can talk about it I can't that's something that's way Beyond me about the engineering and how they'd figure it out and how they do it and our our end we're trying to pick up enforcement right now we have two people in the Traffic Unit right now they're focusing on areas that we having substantial problems like Squire Road there was unfortunately a pedestrian accident down there a little while back and you know they've been FOC focusing over there trying to slow the traffic down and write in citations and some of them they've been selective they're not getting people just going 10 m an hour over some of the tickets I see there are kind of you know very excessive 30 and 40 m an hour over the speed limit at different times of day when the traffic's light and those are some of the chronic offenders we're focusing on so you know we're going to work on it we're trying to like I said staff the traffic department a little better we're in the process of getting some people they're in the police academy now so when we get hopefully those five out we can add another person at the traffic and try to staff it better and have them out there a little more focusing on some of these areas and counselor what else you were looking for some numbers or data yeah Chief I I I requested uh quarterly reports about uh just let me pull up the motion so I don't uh fumble with the wording let's see here much just my my apologies but something essentially along the lines of just quarterly numbers about the number of traffic stops and traffic violations that the city sees yeah no no no no absolutely we can do something like that on a quarterly report and maybe send something out to you with the council just to give you some better information on how things go because we're kind of like at the halfway point this year and our numbers are definitely off and hopefully they'll increase as we go through the year and into next year thank you and and I I do know you know I guess one of the questions that I have for you Chief is just you know I know is it seven or eight eight sectors I apologize well we have seven sectors throughout the city so seven so I I know that there's usually is it one per sector one officer something along those lines yes okay so the I guess uh this is all residents that ask me these questions but if a police officer's patrolling and they observe speeding or they observe someone rolling stop sign is are they able to are they going to pull someone over or they just continue to patrol no they should unless they're on a certain Duty or responded to a call I mean that's in their job description is to enforce traffic laws and the the other thing that makes it a little prohibitive for us as well or it stretches us thin we're call driven here in this Police Department we're averaging around 30,000 calls a year and it keeps increasing every year so it like the offices are going from one call to another to another to another on some nights thank you CH unless anyone else has a question for chief chief right now uh councelor janino I have more general for all the um gentlemen up there right now first of all I'm familiar with the speeding and where it's occurring and how fast they're going I'm also familiar with the speed trailers on how they work and basically reducing the average vehicle down so if car's doing 35 or 40 miles hour and they see the speed sign and it's flashing 25 that's the normal person slowing down saying I didn't realize it was going 35 40 mes an hour whereas the extreme drivers that are driving fast on purpose driving dangerous we're not going to affect them at all however I did see some stuff with Boston right now that they're installing 1500 speed bumps or humps over the next three years and they're putting them in the neighborhoods and on smaller streets that are not travel by buses emergency vehicles and they're putting more than one on some streets so it's a longest street they be two or three humps in a row I was wondering if we could look into something maybe long term not immediately down the line on that on that Avenue no absolutely and with that that I can put you to uh the head of DPW the superintendent he can go over that because a lot of that they've been looking into about how they're going to address some of those issues and I had a conversation but that's definitely for his office and Mr rrom to explain but on your speed trailers that's 100% correct I look at some of the data because those speed trailers have computers in them and it'll show how many cars go down the street the average speed in one of the the uh reports I I looked over and looked at the data 58% of the drivers that were going over the speed limit like 10 mil an hour or 15 mil an hour they decreased their speed as soon as like they came in visual contact with those the speed sign or the speed trailer so it definitely I is good for the average person who is just unaware or not paying attention to what they're doing but like he said for the chronic aggressive driver that's another story and I also know they with the national highway safety Tri traffic Bureau that the speed trailers and the speed humps were two of the more effective ways of making people aware of the speeds they're going and slowing them down not not um the aggressive ones that you're not going to slow them down that's the tickets and towing the cas and stuff like that but the normal person driving and not realizing that they're going 10 miles over at 15 miles over yes thank you Council Chief I'm sorry I just something else pop in my head I think I told this story last year I was in New York took a right on red it's not allowed uh saw a flash got a ticket in the mail Not only was it a ticket it was a picture of my car I zoomed in picture of my plate a video they pretty much said here you can appeal if you want but I wouldn't um and I was told that that's illegal in the state now I understand that but I from what I was told there are talks to potentially legalize that is that something that's happening or that you might know of I've heard some talk about it but I haven't seen anything that's legislatively going through with the state or whatever but a lot of states do do that unfortunately it's not permissible in Massachusetts at this current time they came to us a few years ago with one of the companies and they wanted to make it an ordinance violation as opposed to a Mass General law violation and with the legality involved with it and the appeals process we didn't go with it so it's it's something that's challenging but it's something you know I would love the the state legislator to look into something like that because it would deter some people would fund the high school honestly with the amount of issues we have right now so yeah yeah yeah and just the other thing too and I'll close out with this this is just a thickly settled and a thickly traveled area there's a lot of commuter tra traffic and if you're out at different times of the day early in the morning or later at night there's a lot of traff traffic that just travels to and from through Rivier they come from the north and come from the south and you can see them coming in the morning to go to work and you can see them leaving the area at night so that's another challenge for us as well but we do the best we can in whatever we can do for your Council that we will thank you very much Chief I appreciate it you're welcome uh we have the city engineer and superintendent here good evening Chris Cho superintendent of Public Works just to touch on um councelor janino's um message he said so first off we since this is a major concern of the council and also the mayor's office as well we've been in touch with a company called traffic Logics which gives you the ability to they in they install um temporary speed humps speed cushion and speed tables they made out of a rubberized recycled rubber that can be placed down in the winter fall spring I'm sorry summer fall spring and removed in the winter time for plowing because uh plowing is one of my major concerns with putting these speed humps everywhere there's also um we do have at the DPW now there are five of those speed radar signs that just allow passerbys to know what their speed is they were bought with some Community develop money so those can be installed to help out with the speeding issue um yeah there's a couple of things that we've been looking into but as long as you guys are um as long as the councilors are happy to point out a couple areas they' like to try out some of these measures we'd be more than happy to install a few and see how they go I think we could find a few areas uh councilor street right away all right Sagal trip the Cara of speeding through the to get to Wonderland and trying to be beat the traffic on um Northshore road so it's really urgent down that and I've had probably 15 16 phone calls from residents down there thank you okay thank you counselor counselor sylvestri thank you Mr chairman for the leeway uh with those the the rubber ones you said they're made out of recycled rubber they they screw in correct yeah so they're designed to be bolted into the ground and then at a later date you can remove them okay they're supposed last as long if not longer than regular asphalt speeds and barriers just so you were aware maybe the ones you get were better they just installed a couple up by the Veterans Home in Chelsea um and the problem they're having with them is that uh every so many days the the screws are starting to lift up out of the the bolts that hold them in um so it's it's becoming an issue and and that's happening every few days so just food for thought all right thank you counselor counselor H thank you Mr President Chris thanks so much for being here tonight um so I think we had two motions go in about win AV so maybe if one of those signs could go up um where the senior center is so it's that whole stretch where the senior center is and then it goes all the way to um the playgrounds where the Immaculate Conception is so I think there's one speed limit sign further down Nam mcmackin but um that might be a great area I think um I had put a motion in and I believe councelor McKenna and councelor sa also put a motion in for that area but that might be an a great area to look at if you're looking to set up one of the signs all right thank you councelor we also have some um some of the flashing crosswalk signs that that might work even better in that area great that's what I as thank you all right thank you counselor councelor McKenna thank you um Mr President um there is a I don't know if it's a working sign or not but the used to be a uh sign across the street from uh mcmackin Park when the park was active so the kids could cross the street I I'm pretty sure it's still there uh Paul aeno would you know that councelor an yes the set of lights are still there are they working lights I don't believe they're working no so I mean for a small still there for so we could probably have them fixed um but that used to be utilized when the kids were crossing the street to go to mcmacken field and then when that closed down they shut them we definitely into that thank you yep thank you counselor um just a quick question so well it is a question but I think what one thing that I want to know is the cost so what does it cost uh I know the the speed table on kushman AV was a big Todo we had to run electrical there for the signage so what is a speed table cost what is a speed bump cost with speed hump speed I don't know there's all kinds of things but average cost so the ones that we were looking at on traffic Logics they were around between um round three and four grand a piece uh I do not have the price of an actual asphalt speed hump I believe it's around 8 to 9 Council Jud might be able to answer that better than I can coun the the speed table and the speed humps are two different things the speed tables are like the one on kushman is extremely expensive speed humps along with the painting it usually goes about $6,000 uh depending on how obviously how wide the street is I don't know if you know this question off the top of your head but how much money is budgeted for you know speed deterrence such as the speed tables and whatnot that I do not know if I didn't sorry maybe get back to yeah just take take a note at your leisure appreciate it but I don't believe there's anything that is specifically line item for Speed deter from the sounds of it we might have to have Mr B add one in there for them so but any other counselors have any questions for Mr charmella or Mr rrom Nick did you want to say uh yeah I just wanted to um just bring to everybody's attention that there are a lot of challenges um to installing uh the speed calming measures so I just want to make sure that everybody is aware that um we can't always place um these types of things in the exact you know location that we would want to because of how they affect um driveways and Street intersections and then drainage on the street and things like that um so I just wanted to uh you know bring that to people's attention that you know if we're looking at putting these types of uh uh traffic calming measures out it may not be exactly you know this the location that we're thinking maybe it's 50 feet this way or 100 feet that way or you know that sort of thing and um in a lot of you know of the city there is um there isn't any drainage infrastructure and that plays a big part um in where we can locate uh these types of things so it's just something um to be aware of the challenges that um that come with trying to locate uh these types of um traffic calming measures thank you very much any any other questions from the council I do know we have a couple of residents in line that that have some questions so we give them an opportunity to speak sir name and address for the record please my name is Anthony Canino I live at 240 suffk Avenue the point the reason why I'm here I am on the agenda I believe uh councilor uh Paul told I told him at the last meeting I want to be on the agenda I want to ask uh the uh chief of police several questions one of them is why he hasn't signed my pedla Hawker license sir we're talking about we're talking about speeding I'm going to shut you down I'm going to shut you [Music] down Mr cantino then I'm sorry this is a we had a a presentation about speeding in public safety as far as vehicles are concerned your peder's license has absolutely nothing to do with Public Safety sir so I'm going to ask I don't see your name on the agenda Mr cantino you're excused next person come on up it's safe don't worry hit hit the button in uh name and address for the record ma'am good evening everyone and thank you for all for your services my name is Susie korin and I live at 205 Krish manav and I just wanted to basically address on the topic of speeding and um a lot of traffic violation I've been at my property for a little over 25 years now and um I have grown children who went to Rivier High um whan school at the time when it was whan safety is basically it's um really really high concern I my driveway literally sits across Adam AV uh kushman and Adams if you uh if you have one of those crazy violators they can Ram right into my driveway and hit my house I have actually been hit coming pulling out of my driveway and one of the things that I'm asking and I know it's on your agenda today is um uh uh topic number 31 which thank you for putting that as a a motion for the cameras uh across which is at the um t uh you know uh Crossroads of Adams and kushman I appreciate that and I hope you passed that it's really high concern because I have witnessed um uh no one stops at Adam Street no one absolutely no one you can I've actually even uh offered um Chief Callahan to come and park in my driveway and you can actually pay for the school if you actually catch the violate is for the high school that you're actually seeking for funds just come I give you all permission to park at my driveway and catch all those traffic violators you would make thousands of dollars if not hundreds um you just come and park in my driveway and catch all the violators and speed noise uh mopeds you actually have another motion I think number 36 if I'm not mistaking no 37 excuse me I would really love to add Kush manav and Adams as a quiet Zone there is just insane I mean we have schools One Way both ways actually um there's three ways of school there's Lincoln there's Wayland there's the high school we have a park we have the veterans um who live right across the street that no one even take you know thinks about it's just it's a really really bad um intersection there that is high volume of violators as when it comes to speeding and I mean I can't even get out of my driveway let's just you know I want I'm sorry to reiterate that but um I also am asking I'm hoping that you can take a consideration to make Adam Street go One Way South toward Constitution a and not have anyone turn right or left on kushav I'm asking that sincerely because buses can't even actually turn left when it's high uh you know it's really cold winter months and they just skid and it's a high dangerous you know uphill I'm asking that I hope you can put that in your motion to make Adam Street go one way away from uh kushman because I am really um my my whole family anyone that's in my driveway can actually get killed one day and I don't want that to happen I've witnessed way too many accidents at that intersection and um and not you know not joking aside but the you know Jokes Aside really you're more than welcome seriously you have me on public not no is to come and park uh you know a um a cruiser or somebody in the you know basically Patrol as Chief Callahan mentioned the sectors the seven or eight around the city I don't see any Patrol anymore there used to be high volume of Patrol I want to say about 5 years ago that has stopped there's not one there used to be a police officer think I don't know who it was that would pull over many people at that insane intersection and of course also down the street at uh Sergeant Street um and um and kushman where they uh cross each other there was one police officer that would always um pull a lot of violators I don't know what happened to that per uh that uh particular um uh Patrol there's not many patrols I actually have witnessed police officers in high Pursuit that almost got hit at that intersection of Adams and kushman and unfortunately the uh officer couldn't stop and basically make any type of uh given any uh you know uh tickets to that violator I am you know I know there's a lot of different intersections uh I hope you make a priority because there's kids there's children there's um it just that's that intersection is um I just don't want anyone dying and one of them is me I can just be out there in my yard mowing my lawn I could get hit and um that's how bad it is and I'm hoping that you can make um um you know it's great that there's you know the the uh DPW spoke earlier the gentleman and there's you know uh bumps or uh you know speed tables being put places I know Kush manav is um I know there's one down the street but um it's a little too far away and and the speed is literally from Sergeant Street they run like they run I don't know how fast like they just you know pedal to the metal and to make it to that Kush you know kushman into Adam Street it's just um we need more Patrol men we need more police um patrolling the area and I don't think we have one I don't see one um I at all especially not only from school time but especially during the day where um school zone school time is uh when everything is kind of calm but after 9 o'clock in the morning to like maybe 2: or 3 in the afternoon it's there's just so many violators there and I wish I can you know show share pictures with you but um Kush manav and Adam Street please make that one way going south away from Kush manav and that that all that violators or come and park in my driveway catch every violator bring that Revenue to the that sector and uh do something about it because there is a way to slow down traffic and we we need implementation that's one of the other things that I want to ask and thank you for my time and thank you for coming up and speaking I appreciate it thank you all for your services too thank you have a great night um Mr RR Mr charmela Chief Kahan thank you so much for being here tonight sincerely appreciate it um if there's any other questions we'll send them right to you have a good night calendar item number five hearing called dis ordered on a request from the city planner on behalf of the planning board relative to an ordinance further amending the zoning map of the city of Rivier relative to 1330 Broadway CD to Ted district and the Beachmont fire station at 9:31 winra bav RB to NB good evening sir good evening counselors I'm Tom skroski chief of planning Community Development I'm just wanted to briefly talk about these two zoning changes they're pretty straightforward um the first is uh 1330 Broadway which is actually on 107 just north of brown Circle um right around the time I was starting here at the city October 2022 there was um a zoning map change to take a series of parcels throughout the city that were conservation land um and Zone them as CD uh which is to indicate that those Parcels are not developable Parcels um the one parcel in question 1330 Broadway is an exception um amongst all the others around it and Romney Mars and I think as a result it was inadvertently um Zone CD when it should have um stayed as it it currently was prior to October of 2022 which is a Ted District um so effectively through that scrier air we made this parcel uh value list for the the property owner so that was our fault not theirs and uh we would ask to reclassify this um to make up for that error um and then 931 winr AV which is you know the the beach m fire station we're looking to have that reone to be neighborhood business as it currently stands today all the work that we've been doing to plan um a Redevelopment of the Beachmont fire station into a Community Arts Center that actually I guess I would say it's questionable as to whether or not that would be viable under our zoning as it currently is today if we were to reclassify it as a neighborhood business that would then be a permitted use at the site happy to take any questions if you have them thank you Mr scosi councelor McKenna um oh excuse me I'm sorry this is a public hearing um we are going to open this up to proponents any other proponents seeing and hearing none close that side of the hearing any opponents anyone not in favor closing that side of the hearing councelor McKenna thank you Mr President um Tom I just want to say thank you for uh putting the beach mon um fire station under this um zoning uh change and um I just want to know I don't know I I I shouldn't even bring this up but I know National Grid was up there and they wanted to put um a gas line into uh the Beachmont fire station for free um and it just got held up and I just want to know why it got held up because I um I mean they're still working so it can be done but I was just wondering why it's it hasn't been done so they required uh National Grid um a load letter from the city that basically stated what the anticipated load of any um natural gas use at the site was essentially that it would be used for you know heating only purposes I believe um and so prior to um Chief cherala leaving he had worked with uh a plumber to get all the steps in place to get such a letter drafted and um when this came in front of the council tonight we realized that I'd never actually signed the letter so I signed it today and we should be good to go and that should set us up before that thank you so much any other counselors uh this is going to be referred to zoning on August 26th calendar item number six hearing called dis ordered on a petition submitted by National Grid to install a new new pole number 1550 on Railroad Street beginning at a point approximately 10 ft south of the center line of Lee bar Bank Highway and continuing approximately 648 ft in a West Direction R Mouse is anyone here from National Grid I'm inclined to just place this on file unless there's opposition place on file calendar item number seven hearing called disordered on a petition submitted by National Grid to install a line of underground electrical electrical conduits across Railroad Street to existing manhole a29 from the property line of 30 Railroad Street towards existing conduits on Railroad Street and install conduits from manhole 120 across Railroad Street to proposed new pole 1550 place on file unfinished business business calendar item number eight motion presented by Council zambuto that the city council established by Rule of Order the following criteria of the installation of City councelor portraits in the council chamber one portraits must be of City councilors who have passed away two the individual must have made notable contributions to the city or represents a significant milestone in the history of the city council three the city council shall designate a subcommittee to review nominations based on the contributions or Milestone nominations for portrait shall be I'm sorry portrait display shall be submitted by City councilors only five once a nomination is approved a highquality portrait will be selecting from existing digital photographs and six portraits will be displayed in designated space in the city council chamber approved by the selection committee Council isan buo uh thank you Mr President uh we've discussed this before and U so this pretty much speaks for itself I don't want to prolong anything I think it's important I think that uh we that we control these things and uh so that's why I put this in thank you thank you counselor uh permission to speak from the chair go ahead thank you um just an idea counselor I don't know how you feel about it I think we spoke briefly about it earlier instead of selecting a brand new committee maybe make this part of right now it's the we have a subcommittee that's uh appointments and Personnel my thought was the change this to appointments and recognition cuz when do we ever have Personnel issues but we don't really deal with that so maybe we could make portraits part of recognition so that we have a subcommittee already in place so we don't have to create a a new one um if everybody thinks that's okay it it's created okay so um and just one more question counselor the cost associated with creating the portraits do we know where that's with a well I mean I think the city clerk can speak to that probably not to put you on the spot the prior three portraits that you see above you to the right are were paid for by the families of those individuals and I I I think it should remain that way thank you do we want to make an amendment to the the rules or no I think the I think the committee can determine that and uh should we change this uh I would recommend going forward let's say for a next fiscal year budget that the city council request from the mayor to put line items for such recognition because these portraits can be upwards of over $500 per portrait okay there you go Mr President councelor H thank you Mr President I'd also like to point out that um you know a month or so ago we had a great motion to name a playground in North Rivier after a great man in um Jon Jones who was a longtime ReRe resident um and that was something the council all got behind and I believe we all put that in as a motion together so maybe the recognition subcommittee could also deal with things such as Parks or naming you know playgrounds or areas after C you know council members that I could agree more I think that's a great idea thank you counselor any other counselors all in favor all opposed so ordered C item number nine motion presented by councelor greo SAA that the city council approved the installation of a portrait memorializing The Late City councelor George J rundo Jr and the Joseph A Del graso City Council chamber councelor Gino SAA we'll just send it to the appointments in recognition committee and I'll talk then thanks Bravo referred to appointments and recognition subcommittee next up is is the legislative affairs committee report councelor arenia thank you Mr President there were three items before us uh this evening the first was an ordinance offered by Council Haro an ordinance provided for interpretation services for public meetings and public documents we looked upon that favorably and are looking to move that to a public hearing uh in August if we could have a roll call if necessary this will be ordered to a public hearing the second issue is an ordinance offered by councelor Kelly an ordinance requiring the public of certain records of the police department this was passed favorably and I ask for a roll call to look upon it favorably ordered on a second reading ordered on a third and final reading roll call for engrossment and ordainment shall the city council approve an ordinance requiring the publication of certain records of the police department councel agenzio yes yes councel janino yes yes councelor greo SAA yes yes councelor H this was approved without the the names right councelor I'm I'm so sorry we're in the middle of a roll call I apologize noes yes councilor has voting yes councelor Haro yes voting yes councelor Kelly yes yes councelor McKenna yes yes councel noeli is absent councelor Silvestri yes yes Council zambuto yes yes and council president calandro yes yes the ordinance is engrossed and ordained thank you and the third item a motion presented by councelor Gino that the mayor requests the city planner to draft a zoning ordinance prohibiting short-term rental use in single family zoning districts the uh short term rental office appeared uh before us and they offered some amendments um we have an amended motion uh that we looked favorably upon and we would like to send it to public hearing order to a public hearing thank you onto Communications calendar item number 13 communication from RPD officer singer of rier boxing requesting a temporary fundraising business license pursuant to rier revised ordinances section 5.1 3.04 for the purpose of raising funds for the r boxing program good evening sir name and address for the record please good evening it's Joseph singer at uh 65 yeman Street rev boxing does anyone have any questions I'm I'm ready to to if you uh could just give us a little bit of so basically in addition to what we already have we already have uh online uh merchandise sales in place but I want to be able to set up a pop-up tent in different locations throughout the city so not only we can we can engage more people and get them involved and they can see what we have to offer I'd like to do demonstrations and have kids be able to um show them what they're learning and this way we can get more expand on our program and get more people involved in our community thank you sir councelor Gino SAA Joe this is a fantastic idea anything to involve the kids in the community is is fantastic thank you I appreciate it right now we're running a a free summer program and um in addition to the after school program that's also free so as we expand and we move into our third year um all of the money we raise from our program from is from our merchandise sales so we just want to keep it going and I appreciate all your support thankk you no problem councelor H thank you Mr President Joe I just want to thank you for everything you do for the city for the families for the kids especially um you provide kids with a with an outlet that they didn't have before and you know rever we've always looked at having um a Boys and Girls Club a YMCA something like that as something we' never have and um thank you for everything you do for for the kids and um now just if you can focus on getting a uh a boxing program for the younger kids so I don't have to take my son to Middleton that's that's in the works I mean we we do have I mean I wouldn't be able to do this without all of my volunteers that I help and I got um some great coaches that come and volunteer their time and again all this money that we're raising nobody's receiving a paycheck so they're doing all this after work um sometimes working 10hour days and then coming and volunteering four or five hours a day for the kids so it's it's a great thing we got people that that uh back this program great thanks Joe thanks for everything thank you counselor councelor McKenna thank you Mr President uh Joey known you for a long time I just want to say you know being a teacher for 33 years you you touch kids' lives you make a difference in their for the rest of of their lives so I I just you making a difference like this is just so meaningful and you'll see it you know maybe in five six seven years from now they'll come back or they'll and they'll just say thank you you know you're keeping them off the streets you given them a purpose so you should be congratulated thank you thank you with with that being said just like just like everyone you know that wears a Red Sox hat or a Celtics hat we got the just like I wear this Patriot on my chest this is a sense of Pride for our city so when you see this you'll be able to associate with this logo and when you see people walking around with the Patriot logo the Rivier Patriot you know you're going to be able to know oh he's from Riv we could be in a different city could be in a different state but you see him wearing that Patriot it's a sense of Pride for our city thank you very much councelor sylvestri Joe thanks for coming up thanks for all you're doing how do we make this a permanent license I'm not even looking for permanent I just want to be able to sell what we have to you know we're in a good spot but I want to keep it going we were able to um with our merch merchandise sales we were able to have the rumble and Riv which was our first one this year and I'm hoping to make that an annual thing we had almost 700 people um right now we have 11 kids that compete we have two that have won the Golden Gloves and we have one that has um won a King of the Ring tournament champion so awesome I want to keep those kids active and keep them going continue the good work Joe thanks thank you thank you councelor councel Isam buo thank you Mr President Joe I just want to thank you your your you're helping to shape Young people's lives um I've been involved in a lot of nonprofits um on the board of directors of the celian boys and girls club and I see how kids' lives can be shaped and CH you're changing lives and uh you you to be uh honored for that because it's it's a really big deal and uh I appreciate it thank you like I said One mission same goal we're all here together to work together and I appreciate everybody's support in this community that helps make this happen thank you permission to speak from the chair you weren't getting away that easy I got to say something um thank you for what you do and I just you know I've been to Riva boxing a couple time Joe Joe has extended uh the use of his facility anytime I want to go um and that's how that place is you show up you train you have great coaches you have great equipment um it is it makes me so proud that we have a facility like that and even more proud that people who are born and raised here are running it um and I do want to put a challenge out to the my fellow counselors I don't know if I was the only one but I did sponsor the event The Rumble in Rivier and I want to put the challenge out to the rest of you to make sure that you sponsor that event it is so important so important the work that gets done over there so thank you very much for being here and this is all in favor all opposed so ordered thank you have a good night everyone calendar item number 14 communication from the director of diversity equity and inclusion relative to an ordinance establishing rules and regulations for the display of flags and the use of City Hall director morido thank you Steve morbido 281 Broadway I know this is going to a public hearing but um I just want to briefly fill you in so this um ordinance establishes rules and regulations for the display of flags and the use of City Hall um this ordinance is designed to uphold the values and um uphold state and federal laws of flags within the city it also gives jurisdiction to the city council and the mayor for flag raisins within the city and I can go further into detail um at the public hearing any questions councilor sylvestri yes thank you Mr chairman uh through you to uh Mr marbo um I'm I'm I guess I'm just confused do we need a regulation under the flag raisings I thought it was someone that just comes before us proposes to have a flag raised and and that's what we do I'm not sure what an ordinance or why we would need an ordinance can you help so yes um like I said I'd go further into detail at the public hearing but there was a Supreme Court case ruling shirtliff first Boston where Boston was sued because they declined a Christian uh flag raising and what the Supreme Court found was that they had no Boston had no guidance no rules and regulations in place to follow um there is more into it that I can go into but I don't want to take too much of your time be um we have plenty of time um so are we trying to ban a certain flag from going up we're not trying to ban anything we're trying to give uh create rules and regulations because that's the direction the Supreme Court wants us to go in to create a policy and have policies in place to protect our city from being liable from lawsuits I mean I I think if we we just allow those who want to raise a flag to raise a flag I I don't see any problem that's happen yet for what we're trying to put this in place now have I have I witnessed some some flag raisings that I was uh morally did not agree with absolutely was I at flag raisings that I did not agree with what the speaker was saying 1,000% but as a soldier who fought for this flag I don't think we should be taking anyone's freedom of speech freedom of flag I I don't think we should be doing that um and I I just don't understand what this ordinance so basically the Supreme Court so the ordinance explicitly States the city's flag polls are not intended to serve as a public forum for free Expressions by individuals or groups instead the flags flown represent the official Sentiments of the city of rier so in the short shift case what they were saying was because give me one second so yeah no problem I expect to speak on this I apologize just take your time Mr morbo I think hearing hearing this will be the decision whether this goes to legislative affairs in in a way to uh you know an opinion from the solicitor or if we push it to a public hearing and I know other counselors have questions too just give him a minute okay do you guys want to go over the ordinance you have the ordinance in front of you I can go detail by detail so first we have section 1.10 d10 display of flags so the ordinance ensures that our flags display at City Hall adhere to federal and state guidelines maintaining a sense of order and respect for our symbols of unity it prioritizes the United States flags followed by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts flags and then our city of Rivier flag the or the ordinance grants the mayor and the city council the authority to lower flags at half staff recognizing the um solity of occasions such as deaths of a city employee in the line of duty or other significant events this flexibility allows us to honor and respect important moments and indid individuals within our communities importantly this ordinance also Embraces our City's diversity by allowing for the display of other flags these include flags of recognized governments branches of US military and significant s symbols like the blue star service flag flag and the Mi a missing an action uh prisoner of war flag notably during June we will fly the lgbtq pride flag and juneth flag reflecting um recognition of a diverse Community but more importantly it will be through proclamation of the city council in the mayor um then if we go down to um the legal protections when you look into legal protections and preventing lawsuits in the light so in light of the shirtliff in Boston case it was it was crucial that our city had a clear and precise regulations regarding flag displays to avoid legal disputes um so this this ordinance states that the city flag polls are not intended to serve as a public forum for free expression by indid individuals or groups so it'll be orchestrated by the city of Rivier okay so I I I think I'm going to address the elephant in the room here are we trying to stop a certain flag from being raised because that's that's what it seems like to me is we we're we're trying to create an ordinance well then then what do we need to create an ordinance for because anyone who comes before us I have never seen anyone be denied a flag raising ever so why are we putting a law in place that's going to create a a law behind flag raisings when no one's been denied so this is something that cities across Massachusetts have been doing in across the country since the Supreme Court has made a ruling to pre prevent us from losing money in a lawsuit because you said that a city denied a Catholic a Christian flag from being yes that's is what you said counselor you said a a a city denied Boston denied a Catholic or Christian flag from being raised and when they did so they got sued because they didn't have an ordinance in place that is why they lost so what I'm hearing in all that is we're looking to Prior putting an ordinance in place so we can stop certain flags from raisin we're looking to create guidelines so there's references to to have government expression of government speech expression so right now there is nothing in place if even by Massachusetts Municipal Association they have had meetings with cities all over and over about creating policies Medford Melrose River Lynn Chelsea city of Boston they've all created flag ordinances just to protect the city from liability and suit okay con uh Mr morbido if if if that's what the reason is I I don't think if we're going not looking to deny anyone we don't we don't need to do so but I I like I said before I've been to certain flag raisings that I was disgusted to stand there but I still think they have the right and freedom to do what they say and and rais they they they they they were it's not like they were a Nazi group it was a christas organization and I believe that there this motion solely is intended to block that group from raising their flag and I just don't agree with it the motion is solely to protect the city against Financial Li liability okay thank you uh Council yent thank you councelor councel councelor you Mr President let's just go ahead Mr morbido just really quickly because we have a lot of counselors I'm guys I'm going to be honest with you I'm I'm inclined to just get a get an opinion from the solicitor and then put this back in the subcommittee or put it into the legislative affairs subcommittee because I'm unsure of of all of this and where there is case law around his uh director moro's reasoning maybe we should get an opinion from the solicitor I'm not a legal expert so I can't speak to the legal you do now councelor councilor Zan budo thank you Mr President uh I uh I'm one who feels it's all a none okay if we're going to if we're going to eliminate the Christian or Catholic flag uh as Boston did I'm going to eliminate the pride flag and all the other flags that go up it's all or nothing and that's you're my dear friend you're in charge of Dei that's everybody that's what I think your your job is so it's all or nothing for me I'm either all in or all out nobody gets a flag if somebody I can't stand doesn't get that flag uh or somebody I love get doesn't get that flag and and so so that's where I come down on this uh I agree we need opinions on this I don't think my opinion I'm not a lawyer but I sometimes play one on TV uh but my opinion is we don't need it but let's let's uh you know unless unless we intend to deny people from putting their flags up we we putting everybody's country's flag up we're putting uh uh all kinds of flags up and and that's what I want to continue to do I'm not denying anybody and uh if we're going to do that then that's fine I think we already do that and I I don't see a need for this if if the legal people can convince me we need this then maybe I'll support it maybe I won't but let's let's uh go down that road I think you're absolutely right this needs to go into committee needs to be discussed even before it goes to a public hearing thank you thank you counselor counselor Kelly thank you Mr President I'll be really brief but it I have an All or Nothing opinion on this as well but my opinion is I would rather just have the Commonwealth of Massachusetts flag uh the United States flag the city of Riva flag maybe the palia blue star service flag and that's it I think this opens the door if you're going to allow one you have to allow them all we have to be very careful that this is an ordinance that is even applied even-handedly across the board or it's going to open us up to issues um and right off the bat reading the ordinance I know that the Supreme Court case made a reference to um reversing the two lower court cases and siding with the plaintiff um because they specifically cited the issue of duration of the display of the flags that the the flags were displayed for a very short period of time and I don't see any time frames for the display even mentioned in this so it gets into the issue if one flag is raised for 4 hours and one flag is raised for a week or or a month so I think there's issues with this I do also I just want to point out that I understand Mr morabito's um objective with this because to put something in place to say that we are not stating that the flag pole is a forum for public speech it is more a sentiment of the city I think that's what he is um surrounding the the that why we need the protection if we make that statement and we have the an ordinance that contains that language then we are somewhat being protected under that case law and to that I agree with however I do think there are holes um in this ordinance so that we definitely need to send it to subcommittee and get um expert legal opinion and guidance on it thank you thank you counselor councelor Jero yeah I just ask a question so the flags that fly right now do they do they fly at the request of the mayor the Dei director a community partner a resident right now today currently there is no policy in place no rules and regulations so how does the flag end up on our flag pole today in the past it was organized not in the past because we had a flag raising on Thursday so right now it's just done basically by um it's can be done by a private group they can come and ask the mayor or right now there's no application process there's so right now a private person can come and request for a flag to be flown they can ask to and the assumption is that they're doing so to express their rights freedom of expression so what you're telling me is that in section 11010 CA you want to stop what is currently happening right now is what I'm hearing from this I don't want president you want to have no personal opinion I'm not asking you that's what you're proposing right you're proposing in this based on the conversation that you and I just had in front of our colleagues that we want to stop president the answer is yes the answer I think is very clear for everybody here that it's yes thank you thank you councelor councelor Gino SAA hi Mr Mido okay so what I'm getting out of this I I was listening to the last comment that councelor sylvestri made which really resonated so you're telling me that it's okay for somebody to come in here and say oh let's put up a Nazi flag that's okay because there are no rules in place I agree with councilor Mido there needs to be rules and there needs to be things set in place that okay they have to come in front of the council or they have to come in front of the committee and you do have to make a decision that way and it should be on caseby casee basis it shouldn't be everybody can just get a flag it it just needs it needs they you need to have regulations I don't understand what the problem is well all set thank you counselor councelor agenzio thank you Mr President and u i I apologize Mr Mar for you're walking into this Hornet's Nest I knew at some point this was going to happen um for several years I've had the opinion and I agree with councelor Kelly that the flag polls in front of City Hall and this is coming from someone that attends every celebration out front I think they're the greatest thing I think you should have the United States flag the state flag the city flag and the flags of the military anybody can come to the front of City Hall whether they're sanctioned by the city or they're not you can have a protest you can uh talk in a loudspeaker you can do anything you want you can pass out sandwiches you can make your feelings known so these celebrations I I want to see them continue cuz I enjoy every one of them I went to the Colombian flag raising uh last week I'm going to the Peruvian Flag raising this week I've went to Pride I went to uh uh juneth I went to the Christian flag raising if someone's doing something out front I go uh but I don't think we need to involve the flag poles they government building United States state city military and and have our celebrations and enjoy and enjoy everyone's company that's my and I've had this this opinion for years and I said one day something's going to come along here I mean by trying to decide uh which country goes up or which group goes up which one doesn't then we're starting to talk ideology and I don't think that's something we we really need to get into so that's my opinion thank you thank you counselor and as I stated earlier there's a lot to unpack here uh if there is uh the Supreme Court has issued a decision that we need to look at if you know neighboring communities are also creating ordinance we should have the solic make sure that this ordinance is not violating somebody's rights because then that opens us up to a lawsuit I think you know we've had some really wonderful flag raisings outside and if it's safer for us to create an ordinance than we should but we have to do it carefully so my recommendation is that we put this into legislative affairs and await an opinion from the solicitor if anybody objects to that okay coun uh director morbido is there anything else that you wanted to share I just want to follow up on um uh the counselor who spoke for me um obviously I would never do that be assume someone's um what he said was absolutely false that was not my view I just want to CL put that on record absolutely I would never put words in someone's mouth and I appreciate each and every one of you like I said um Mr President did tell me that I was just giv a quick brief presentation that it would go to um public hearing and the solicitor will be here to answer legal questions I'm no legal expert and I just want that on Expert uh on record that I can't speak legally about this that I'm just presenting the ordinance before it goes to public hearing not sorry to interrupt you but from my protection and I I think I can speak for everybody else before I vote on anything before I discuss anything I feel like we're messing with freedom of speech here that's not a again I'm not an expert in any of that um but I I do feel this should go to legislative affairs we should get something in writing from our solicitor to give us some direction uh because I I I'm actually uncomfortable even having this discussion so we do have a some people in line to speak just to let you know that this was reviewed and uh written by um the solicitor as well so but he can speak to it at the public hearing or subcommittee thanks thank you director and we do have a member of the public wishing to speak good evening sir name and address for the record please Ed Terell 7 schol Street Rass my question in all this is what what are the sentiments of the city and how are they defined and they it has to be explicitly put out there because if it's not we're definitely going to get sued thank you Mr President thank you sir this is going to be referred to legislated of Affairs calendar item number 15 communication from the veteran service officer requesting a public hearing for an Ord establishing rules and regulations for Veterans Memorial polls in the city of Rivier just refer to legislative affairs calendar item number 16 communication from the city auditor requesting a transfer of all Wonderland parking revenue from FY 24 to the high School stabilization fund good evening Mr viske good evening Mr President Rich visque City CFO 281 Broadway um before you is a request of um transferring rental uh car revenue and other revenue generated from the Wonder Lang parking lot uh into the high school stabilization uh fund that was created earlier this year um had a lot of requests um counselor so we uh Guan sa was one of them letting us know that you know be a great idea to put these revenues generated from that land into the stabilization fund the administration tends to agree and what you see before you is uh the transfer of all those dollars into that fund for fiscal year and then 2024 and I'm happy to answer any questions on that any questions Council Lian buo thank you Mr President uh uh to the C for uh how much money we're talking I believe let me see here grand total councelor Gino SAA listen I'm proud of my motion and we are going to be raising many many dollars just by this motion alone just getting this money from the cars being parked there until it's built so sorry Tony thank you counselor any other counselors wishing to speak roll call shall the city council dedicate 100% of the rental Revenue collected from the so-called Wonderland site under Mass general laws chapter 64l to the high school stabilization fund established under Mass general laws chapter 40 section 5B effective for fiscal year 24 beginning on July 1st 23 councelor agenzio yes yes councelor janino yes yes councel Gino SAA yes yes councelor H yes yes councelor hero yes yes councelor Kelly yes yes councelor McKenna yes yes coun noeli is absent councelor sylvestri yes yes Council zambuto yes yes and council president C Leandro yes yes the motion's approved calendar item number 17 communication from the city auditor relative to the educational technology program ETP expenditures for the city council chamber AV upgrades Mr CFO thank you Richard viske 21 Broadway City CFO um as you can see in the pack um city clerk had um presented an application to the ETP uh committee requesting These funds uh for a new AV system for the city council chambers that was approved uh by the committee and what we're doing now is just formalizing that by um executing a appropriation transfer from that fund into the proper account to pay for those upgrades so happen to answer any questions on that any questions from the council all in favor all oppos so would it calendar item number 18 communication from the city auditor relative to the FY 24 year and transfers Mr Vis thank you um yes uh typically every uh year that ends in July we come before the council as we clean up our books and make all um transfers that are not allowable under law uh by a department uh themselves they can typically transfer money within their Department if it's a salary to salary or or expense to expense however when those transfers are made between departments or between salary and expense lines a voter city council is required to do so um there's a long list of the ins and outs of these transfers and uh like I said typically we do this at the end of the year so we can see when the dust settles um what accounts need to be addressed in some of these cases these transfers are more than what's needed but we know when we close the books that these funds go to the bottom line but just to ensure that we close the books with no deficits which um this transfer allow us to have no deficits in any of our accounts including our snow and ice so um have't answering questions on any of the particulars of that thank you any counselors have questions all in favor all opposed so ordered calendar item number 19 communication from the city auditor relative to an appropriation for the transportation Network assessment Mr B good evening um again this this is one that this council's seen I think it's about 5 years old um the um for those who don't know the uh ride share programs Uber and uh lyt in particular every ride that's generated in the city here we receive one penny for each um and one penny one dime for each ride generated so for fiscal year 2024 actually it's a calendar year but for calendar year 2024 the revenue uh generated for the city of river was 22,6 $ um we've used this money typically for um the purposes uh that it's uh required which is to address impact of Transportation on Municipal roads Bridges and other Transportation infrastructure this year during budget talks we thought it was a good idea to um appropriate this money for um the operation of the blue bike networks in the city as well as um a lot of the traffic calming measures that are coming before you so um with that we are looking to use this 122,00 and that manner that um complies with the law and also gives us some uh operating funds for our blue bikes and alternative transportation uh measures caling uh Road common Etc Tom's here to speak a little bit on if there's any particular questions but um otherwise we just need an appropriation to move those dollars thank you very much councelor H thank you Mr President Rich thanks for coming I just had one question where did the 10 cents per ride come from is that a state generated um yeah I think it's a state law that's passed through to the cities and um as a receipt reserve for appropriation they require us to come before the legislative body so that's uniform for the whole state 10 cents we couldn't go up to like 13 cents no yeah there's no local option to increase it right now it's 10 cents but uh yeah thank you thank you celor um just do you know if that's if the ride originates in the city or if it's dropped off here if it originates okay going to start taking Uber to Council meetings thank you well just to put it in context that's 1.22 million rides that generated in the city for 2023 so one point wow any other counselors all in favor all opposed so ordered Kell item number 20 communication from the city auditor requesting a transfer from the cable access receipt reserved fund to R TV invoices councilor is anyone have any questions I didn't think so all in favor all oppos calendar item number 21 communication from the city auditor relative to the community Improvement trust transfer for mcmacken field cleanup and Rehabilitation any counselors have questions I have one question councelor agenzio the uh Community Improvement uh trust fund that's usually broken up by Ward right so is this coming out of a particular Ward or just from the general is coming out of the ward one council is um a portion of that um Community Improvement trust fund right now we're closing the books and I was going to get um everybody's balance as of June 30th as we close the books right now but we've we we've uh We've uh confirmed that there's more than enough money in councilor McKenna's e um CIT fund for this for this transfer thank you very much thank you counselor any other counselors all in favor all opposed so ordered Calem number 22 communication from the city auditor relative to the community Improvement trust transfer for Oak Island Park improvements any counselors have questions counselor Gino SAA I'm very excited that we're going to finally have the floor done at Oak Island Park and I want to thank the um planning and development for taking that and going with it and trying and getting a grant for $199,000 so I only have 44,000 coming out of the CIT trust fund in W five thank you thank you counselor any other counselors all in favor all opposed so ordered thank you everybody calendar item number 23 communication from the mayor relative to the appointment of Rocky Graziano to the cultural Council referred to appointments calendar item number 24 communication from the mayor relative to the reappointment of Bill Rey to the Council on Elder Affairs for two appointments calendar item number 25 communication from the mayor relative to an act authorizing the city of Riviera to pay a certain sum of money to Denise Mattia candelli Widow of school committee men Anthony Mattia request to suspend the rules all in favor all opposed and unless there's any questions take a roll call shall the city Council approve an act authorizing the city of Riviera to pay a certain sum of money to Denise Mattia candelli Widow of school committee men Anthony Mata councel agenzio yes yes councel janino yes yes councel Gino SAA yes yes councelor H yes yes councelor Haro yes yes councelor Kelly yes yes councelor McKenna yes yes councel noeli is absent councelor sylvestri yes yes and Council zambo yes yes and council president C Leandro yes yes the special legislation has been approved back to the regular order of business calendar item number 26 communication from the mayor relative to the reappointment of Mary vigata to the Council on Elder Affairs appointments calendar item number 27 communication from the mayor relative to the reappointment of Arthur Pelton to the zoning board of appeals appointments calendar item number 28 communication from the mayor relative to the appointment of Thomas Carlton to the Conservation Commission appointments calendar item number 29 communication from the mayor relative to the appointment of Amelia B to the Conservation Commission I don't know about this one I'm just kidding appointments on to motions calendar item number 30 motion presented by Council noeli that the mayor requests the traffic commission to authorize the installation of speed bumps in the vicinity of 29 Franklin a and 139 Campbell AV traffic coming measures are required is speeding is a major complaint of the Neighbors in this area uh councelor novaski is not here tonight but he has asked if the council would be able to vote this out favorably for him this evening all in favor all [Music] opposed I'm sorry we do oh never mind Cal item number 31 motion present by councel C council president cogliandro that the mayor requests the chief of police to install a traffic camera at the intersection of kushav and Adam Street on poll number 1370 permission to speak from the chair uh I'm just you know what I'm going to just go ahead and let the resident who lives directly in the middle of that intersection speak on my behalf thank you go name and address for the record ma'am thank you again uh my name is Susie kaven and I'm at 205 Kush manav I don't want to reiterate but I forgot to add uh in this motion number four that we well agenda number four and now we're in agenda number 31 can we also add crosswalks I forgot to mention that earlier in my um when I was basically speaking of uh safety and um speeding and all the traffic violation that occurs at this intersection if we can we don't have any crosswalks both on both sides uh one uh on each side of left and right of my property and also at um I think there is one at at street but I I don't know it by uh by heart so it would be three like uh like this so uh left uh East West and then the South we don't have uh crosswalks just in addition to this uh motion um to install cameras thank you so just just so you uh for for your information ma'am and I know we've discussed this previously the switch to switching at the direction of a street or making it one way in crosswalks those are all decisions of the traffic commission so as counsil as we can file a motion uh the end decision is there is that's consist of the chief of police fire engineer city planner DPW so just so you know but more than happy to do that just crosswalks in addition uh that would be great thank you absolutely uh on the uh on the motion uh in regards to the camera again this is all part of traffic coming I think that intersection point was made by the resident earlier that you get to the the top of that hill and you don't stop maybe you you roll up to the top so you can see because a car parks on that corner all the time I don't even want to know how many near misses you guys see every day so on that note all anyone else all in favor all opposed so ordered calendar item number 32 motion presented by councelor Hero that the mayor requests mot to install a fence along the middle of Square Road extending from 35 square road to 407 Square Road in the interest of Public Safety council zambo is recorded as recused from this motion councelor Yaro Mr President thank you we've heard a lot about the um unfortunate pedestrian accidents happened in Squire Road I've been in conversation with at least one of our colleagues here uh who is going to present a an amendment to which I'm amendable um and so I will um say that thank you counselor councelor janino I'm not in favor of fences on Square Road for um a few reasons first of all the the landscape on Square Road in the last couple years has has been looking pretty good we went from having all weeds 4 foot high weeds down here for long I could remember till having a landscaped there sprinkler systems in there in the um just for the maintenance reasons for the the landscaper cutting the grass and stuff i' like this you know look into this a little deeper thank you counselor permission to speak from the chair thank you um so I share Squire Road as a w three and with councel Gino and Ward six one of the things that I'm thinking of is the businesses on that on Squire Road pay a premium to be seen by x amount of car as I recall uh ually moving my business to Squire Road years ago the rents were so high because of the number of cars that go by and putting a fence up would eliminate a lot of that traffic a lot of the ability to see um there again there's Plumbing under there there's the Landscaping is beautiful now there are crosswalks that people can safely cross I I do it often going to the wellness center and uh I would I mean I'm not 100% in in on board with this ense but I am willing to refer it to Public Safety for further discussion Mr President sorry yep counselor go ahead um before referring to Public Safety uh I'd like to added the motion after the word mot to say request mot to conduct a visibility study on a pedestrian foot Bridge somewhere on Square Road between 35 and 407 Square Road forgive me but where would you think a I don't know that's for massau to decide that's why we're asking for a feasibility study that's what that's why the amendment is madam clerk is all set with that this is prior to referring to Public Safety if we're just asking for a feasibility study on a foot Bridge I'd be apt to vote Yes on it um right now so instead of referring it I don't know the rest of the council feels okay so on the motion as amended all in favor all opposed so ordered calendar item number 33 motion presented by councel greos SAA that the mayor request the Building Commissioner to develop a procedure checklist for residents wanting to do work on their property the list should include permit types requirements and other departments that may need to issue permits such as the Conservation Commission DPW zba or city council councelor Gino sa thank you Mr President um just in the last month alone I've had three residents actually Four counting today come to me I rate that they have gone to the building department to seek information on permitting although they were given the proper information they were not given the various departments that they may also need to seek information from when they begin the work they don't realize that they may need to seek other approvals such as a negative determination from the Conservation Commission uh because they live in a flood zone or near the rney marsh this causes residents a lot of dilemma because they have already begun the project believing that it's okay to do so so this should not be happening in this day and age we should be able to inform residents of the proper procedures that need to be taken in order to complete their projects therefore I am requesting that once a resident comes to the building department seeking a permit and particularly for fencing walls or driveways they are giving a a list with other phone numbers and emails that they may be required to contact UM in respect to their residential areas uh conservation laws most strictly enforced in areas of the flood Plains and flood zones and rivers and Ry mash and they can because they can cause damage to surrounding homes so it's really really important that this checklist be made and they know exactly where to go I have spoken to the building department and I think they are in the process of making this checklist for me so um I just want to make sure that it becomes it comes into fruition thank you thank you counselor any other counselor is wishing to speak I I think this is a great motion we have a res president sir good evening name and address for the record please Anthony POS Ali 51 Arcadia Street this happens a lot in Oak Island five of my neighbors have pavement driveways that they shouldn't have had and they had to work out deals well just add drip edges to make conservation happy what I would really like to see and I don't know if it's within this council's power if you guys could ask the mayor or whoever why give out the permit until everything's been checked off so start with the building department building says okay DPW says okay then the next as she has the checklist but it you don't get the permit until you go and get your condition order of condition from the conservation committee then you get your permit because my neighbor this just happened last week man neor pamm just put in a driveway and then she had conservation at her house she's like I didn't know I have a permit that says I can build so I would instead of a the checklist idea is great and the council's on the right path I'd like to see the permit not hand or not delivered or not received until every every board or everybody that what I'm trying to say is we should know if I go to pull a permit and say Arcadia Street they should go oh well you that's a flood zone you need to go see this no permit until then thanks thank you sir anyone else councelor yo yeah I think this is a a really great motion and that uh we need to constantly um inform our residents of what the checklist I I I don't I know the council women from the point of Pines is amendable to this but um maybe we can add something in here about being posted on their City website and the building Department's we um absolutely section so um great idea though I love this on the motion to amend on that on the motion that on the motion as amended all in favor all opposed uh calendar item number 34 motion presented by councilors novaski and Gina SAA that the mayor reinstate the outside water meter program to allow seniors to monitor water usage outside without adding the store charge the water department should provide seniors with an acceptable outside adapter for under $40 to enable them to take the meter to the water department for proper credit councelor Gino SAA thank you I have spoken to um superintendent Chris charm on this and there's quite a few issues regarding these outside meters so if if it's okay with the rest of the council I would like to send it to my Elder Affairs committee so the elderly can come in and speak to um Mr chamela he has agreed to come and speak with them on possible options that they can have other than that outside meter thank you counselor councelor H thank you Mr President I also spoke to a few seniors about this um and I also spoke to the DPW super about this and it seems that the city is kind of getting away from the the physical meters like a lot of surrounding cities and towns they're going more to the automated um plan where you pick up the meter that it's a little bit more expensive you have to have a plumber come out to the house and I think the meter costs about $430 maybe but um from what I was told the city's looking to get away from the resident bringing the actual meter excuse me to the to the water department and I guess there were a lot of issues with their residents leaving them out over the winter them freezing cracking and they weren't giving accurate reading so there were some issues with the physical meters thank you thank you counselor councelor Kelly uh thank you Mr President I also spoke to several seniors about this so I'm wondering um and I know there were problems with going this was in um use at one point and they stopped it for a number of reasons I think councilor SAA uh said there were a number of issues that came up and that's why they were discontinued so i' love that for um to have a discussion with them and see maybe if there's even any um discounts or something that we could possibly give to the seniors so that they can have some type of relief here thank you thank you counselor any other councelor garina SAA um councelor Kelly that is exactly what we were looking at is trying to give them um a specific discount just for seniors if that's going to be feasible thank you unless there's any opposition to putting this into the Elder Affairs subcommittee that's where I will refer it to calendar item number 35 motion presented by councelor agenzio that the mayor request National Grid to install a support poll at the corner of human Street and Warren Street the current distance between the existing poles on the west side of human Street do not allow for wires servicing the east side of human Street to be the required height over the street causing trucks to pull wires off homes on a cons on a consistent basis councelor Areno uh thank you Mr President just as it states here in the um in the motion uh the distance from one side to the other uh is too great so the wire is Sag and they're not at the required 14 ft off the street so those uh homes on the West Side have um excuse me the East Side have suffered them being torn down quite uh quite frequently thank you thank you counselor any other the counselors maybe the mayor can also request that National Grid start showing up to meetings all in favor all opposed so ordered calendar item number 36 motion presented by councel greo SAA that the mayor requests DCR to install and extend a quiet Zone signage on Rivier Beach Boulevard from its current Terminus to carry Circle Council Gino SAA pot of Riva beach has quiet zone signs up and this particular part of Rivia Beach is like after the restaurants and what's happening is after the police come down and they tell everybody to disperse a lot of the cars a congregate in front of these home um this residential area coming from um say Antonia's all the way to the circle um and what's happening is they're playing their music and they're disturbing the residents that live there so I'm requesting that DCI have quiet zone signs just put up there for these residents and I appreciate it thank you thank you counselor any other the counselors councilor sylvestri just is is there are they not holding to ordinance through you to the counselor are they not holding to ordinance to to the state police uh because they usually come down kick them off and they even tow cars they're moving down further where the police don't go okay thank you counselor on the motion all in favor all opposed so Ed calendar item number 37 motion presented by councelor sylvestri that the mayor request the traffic Commission in conjunction with the city's polic policy writer and analyst to develop an enforcement and confiscation mechanism for Section 10.1 6171 operation of motorized scooters prohibited of the revised ordinances of the city of rier as written the traffic regulation is unenforceable councelor sylvestri thank you Mr chairman I I think the motion speaks for themselves I I know the the chief was up here a few weeks ago and and we spoke about this and and he described how H it is to to to Really police this but um I've been getting call after call after call I'm watching people zoom in and out going up the wrong way one gentleman jumped up on the sidewalk the other day to get around the bus um Boston I know they're a lot bigger police department but they do also have a lot bigger space they they did a Sting the other night they rounded I think there was something like 20 arrests 20 bikes taken for non-registry non-insured so I think there's something that has to be done we have to send a message that they just can't run free through the city thank you Mr chairman counselor I I just want to let you know the mayor did uh let me know today that we did confiscate five scooters today so where're where're it yes Round of Applause absolutely see how fast my motions were un teach me counselor how how to do that U on the motion uh councelor janino just for the record it was eight toad 10 citation two arrests we have no further business Mr President councelor McKenna I'd like to make a point of personal privilege please State your point counselor I'd like to give a shout out to the DPW um Bill guaso Steve Penta Michael Wells Mike Wells U Michael Wells son and Nick s for going above and beyond cutting overgrown uh tree pits and grass on WI Tri in Crescent AV well past 6:30 on a Friday night thank you very much and it looks beautiful thank you counselor we will be adjourned and our next meeting is Monday August 26 thank you all for being here tonight have a good night e