##VIDEO ID:LrqW93lAIes## good evening everyone and welcome to the September 23rd Elder Affairs subcommittee meeting please rise and salute the flag I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all roll Club the members of the Elder Affairs subcommittee Council janino here here councilor Haro is absent Council McKenna here here Council zambuto here here and chairwoman GRE OAA present here Quorum is present we have one item on tonight's agenda and that is a motion presented by councilors noveli and Gina SAA that the mayor reinstate the outside water meter program to allow seniors to monitor water usage outside without adding the sewage charge the water department should be able to provide seniors with an acceptable outside adapter for under $40 to enable them to take the meter to the water department for proper credit I'm requesting Chris charmela superintendent of Public Works to come up hello councilors Chris chera 519 malder Street do you have some questions according to our Chris after our numerous conversations um I would like to know what you feel would be the best way to handle the situation I know we doing away with the water meetings correct um so can you explain to the seniors what the best way would be for the city to help them out as best as possible so the current program we have now is um instead of the exterior outdoor water meter there's an interior meter installed inside the property the exterior meters have problems with during the winter they would freeze Sometimes some of the scenes get frustrated when the um numbers didn't match up when they came in because sometimes they freeze and issues occur with them these new meters are installed the home in the home and it's a separate account so the current tiers which is so seniors also get a discount based on the tier system that they fall into 65 and over so 30 30% um 30% is deducted if they use less than 25,000 gallons then it goes to 20% and 10% so depending on their water usages the exterior deduct meters are actually included in that figure so which makes them fall into a lesser deduction bracket the interior meters have their own separate account so it would not remove a senior that's using getting the higher percentage reduction from that bracket and thus losing money in effect okay um it also um removes the need for the resident to bring in the deduct meter it's a separate account that's built automatically through the MTU that's attached to it okay um I'm I think councelor noveli was part of this motion as well did you want to say something councelor thanks thank you Chris yep thank you iron Noy 53 Deon Street uh I knew this came up at the Elder Affairs uh committee meeting and uh I thought we should hear it you know and hopefully we can do something for him I know you've found out that some of the issues that happened with the outside water meters uh with some people trying to take advantage of it and uh I thought maybe we could take care of our seniors in rever and give them some kind of break so thank you thank you Council McKenna thank you could I ask Chris uh to come back up here is the is there a cost uh for the interior meters there is okay could you tell me how much they are they are the meter is 185 and the MTU which actually reads the data is 235 so it ends up being around 400 something bucks that's a lot of money for seniors to put in their house excuse me she said plus installation by a plum oh really so a plumet has to do it d yeah that's a lot of money for seniors to to dish out I mean well that that uh just so you guys know that is the program across the board okay if there's some type of um I I know I think the mayor might be applicable to giving him some type of working out some type of deal working out of cost deduction for the free no I'm only kidding uh I just want to ask one more question those out umide meters um the outdoor meters are they still can we still bring them into City Hall and get our rebate for them y until at this point we can still record the um the whoever still has a meter well you guys can bring those into DPW and we'll record that data and take it off your last water bring it Wednesday when we have a meeting all right thank you yep Council zambo thank you madam chair um couple things uh I've already heard from a lot of seniors who have spent the money to put the hardwire meter in and it's not cheap the and and there was a a glitch in the software you couldn't the the system is now you order uh you have your plumber pull a pamit Your Plum aose a permit now you're allowed to go and purchase the meter so so you go down to the DPW and buy this meter for $475 and then you have it installed by a plumber which can be probably 1,000 bucks or more so it's not cheap it's expensive I've heard from a half dozen people who have done it seniors and they want to know wait a minute they told me I couldn't use the meter anymore and I put a hard wire a hard meter in and and now I'm hearing that they're going to do something for the seniors so these seniors want a rebate so it's it's going to create a problem now I I'm all for subsidizing Seniors Helping them maybe purchase the meat or I I don't know what the May has in mind but I'll support whatever it is but uh uh once you say something's gone you can't bring it back and and as much as I I would love everybody to have a meter uh uh for you know 35 or whatever they used to cost $45 uh and the fraud that went on those meters was unbelievable people were taking them to their summer cottages and using them and I I mean it was just ripwood fraud I'm not probably wasn't any of my seniors that did that but but uh you know that's what was going on so I mean you know me I'm a truth teller and I have to tell the truth so uh I'm not going to support going backwards uh I'll support subsidizing in any way we can uh if we can we can find it in our budget and in our hearts to do that but uh uh it's this is what we've got now we're either we're either going to go back to the old ways or we're going to be in the 21st century here where we are and uh so that's you know I've had a I've had a water meter second water meter in my house for I don't know 15 years at least uh and you know and and and that's how you of course now we got another problem because it's not it's not reading or showing you on your bill what you would deduct it so that's a whole another issue I have to take up after this meeting with with with the commissioner okay that's that's all I have thank you counil Council Mel yeah this is a thank you so much uh chairwoman um just want to express my support for this I think that whatever we can do to ensure that we're making it more affordable for our our longtime residents to stay in the city is is very important and so um I really think that we should continuously and I don't know if our our body has the ability to do or if the Administration has the ability of continuously find ways to increase cost savings particularly for homeowners um who have been here for a long time have been giv back to our community for a long time and uh they want to continue to be part of our community um which is such they're such an important fabric uh of here this here city which we all love um and they're they're they've they've forged a path forward for the next Generations whether they're sitting in this chairs or on my lap and so uh whatever we can do to continually audit those cost savings for them would be great and um this is one of those things that we can do let's get them done thank you councelor jenzel thank you madam chairwoman um paulag jenzi award for counselor but I'm speaking as the past DPW and superintendent I want to Echo what superintendent chelo said the old meters uh the hose meters that we had a lot of problems with them as councelor Zeno pointed out there was a lot of fraud not I'm sure the seniors aren't going to do that but um there was a lot of fraud with them uh the calibration on them a lot of times was not correct 50 gallons would go through the meter would show 65 it would show 40 um they freeze you bring them in you have a broken meter it can't be read um so I think the better solution would be to uh talk to the mayor and see about some reduction in the cost of the meter uh the pad plumbed meter uh maybe waving the cost of a uh plumbing permit um maybe the city could do something uh put out an RFQ or RFP and and see if we could get plumbers that will come in at a reasonable uh rate I don't know if that's permissible but a reasonable rate for these seniors I know it is a expensive initial cost uh but it's permanent uh it gets rid through the internet and it's a much more reliable system so I I think that would probably be a better uh Avenue to pursue thank you very much thank you Council noeli thank you for the levity um I wonder if through you I wanted to ask the superintendent can outside meters not not supplied by the city be used if somebody went out to a plumbing place and they had the same kind of meter I heard they were only about 40 bucks so I'm just curious to see if outside meters could be used Mr charma so to answer that question the meter Network we use is census based so the only meters that would be supported by that system are census based meters so other other um Badger other types of Brands just won't be supported by our Network unfortunately thank you y um Council Gino I have an agreement with um Council Zino with the had Plum meters in there not the portable ones okay Rich vke City auditor please come up and let everybody know what we've discussed thank you good good evening Council uh Rich visque CFO to on Broadway um I've had some conversations uh throughout the day about this um this meeting about the meters and um I've tried to gather some data just to put some perspective on it and then I'll kind of let you know where I think we may be able to head with this um so right now in the system there's 2,95 of these meters ERS that are out there um if we take the cost which is 38250 if we were to suppose let's just give everybody one of these meters and it doesn't cost anything to the resident the city would have to come up with $1.1 million so that's probably not a not not a great solution however we did uh extrapolate some data on how many of the 2,95 are actually being used through the um the program and it comes out to around 12257 M again that same math on $382 is about $480,000 just for meters and mtus which the MTU is the device that allows it to read it through the radio feeds which everybody knows that we went through a extensive uh replacement of the meters uh several years back so um listening to everybody and and trying to uh help with the seniors especially um I know they're um you know on fixed income so we're trying to figure out ways to um make this less of a burden so um first thing we'd have to do is figure out how many of the 1,57 that are actually using it would be qualified as seniors so I think we can do a cross reference to our senior uh baitman program and get a better idea of what that 1257 how many of those are seniors and then um preliminarily with some talks with the mayor and some talks with the council we're looking at trying to set some up where we would wave the permit cost is $55 for permit so that would be uh at$ 1,257 that's about $70,000 worth of waved fees which I think we can handle easily and then um what I'd like to do is at least look at trying to give a 25% discount on those um heaters to the seniors again at 12257 25% of that is about $120,000 the trickier part is the installation of the meters um I think that's needs a little more discussion because we could potentially put out a an RFP to have plumbers put them in at that set amount but I think everybody's house is a little different there may be some seniors that have relatives or friends that are plumbers that may be able to give them even a better price so I think the installation probably should left be left at Standalone for those people but we definitely have the ability to try to um pull back some of these expenses to uh comply with getting rid of the the outside meters um aside from all of that as a city auditor here the outside meters are a giant risk they're a giant audit risk I don't want to call it fraud but I think everybody knows what you can do with any kind of meter you can unscrew and screwing into any hose in the city again I've had one I've got rid of ir they freeze they break sometimes they come in people have more water used on the meter than they actually got build for you know we can't go accusing who's doing what or whatever but just like the meters we we replaced these meters become old they're calibrated slow they're not reading properly they're they're uh their time has come and gone so um with the census meters and the and the software we have if you have a hard meter that's piped in that's only building you for water you're not going to have any mystery deduction on your Build That You Don't See you're just going to get built for water you're not going to get built for S um it's definitely the right way to go for the city and the community as a whole and you know the only other thing is that if if we do provide a discount for this and it comes out of our water and soil ultimately other people pick up those costs it's not as if we can reduce these costs and and the money doesn't come out of nowhere so some of those things have to be contemplated when we talk about the program but I feel pretty confident that we can uh at least wave perent cost and give a discount on the meter and the MTU at some number some percentage but I'm not really prepared to deliver anything until I do a little more math but perhaps um at another meeting we can drill down a little bit and see what uh what this may cost and how we can help our seniors thank you Mr V do any of the seniors would like to talk or any of them hi Linda dity 24 Mill Street Rivier um I'm a lifelong resident in Rivier and we had one of the water meters the water meters broke and I can't get another one um I don't think the program has ended because a lot of people are still bringing them in and um getting the discount so I think the program is still in effect it's just that they haven't decided which outside water meter to use um I'm just I want to thank um the people who supported it um Angela and um Ira thank you um but I just think that a lot of seniors have Gardens we're um we're trying to water our Gardens and I just don't think that um so so Deb de Julio Elder Affairs um 119 Arnold Street I just they they're a little disheartened when they just heard rich and heard um Chris because what they were hoping for was an outside media they don't want the inside medas and I know we've switched over but there are people in the city that have outside meters there's still a lot of people with outside meters so if they're going to have them you know it's kind of like now you want a senior who meet a broke go out and spend $500 another thousand for a plumber and whatever and you know put it in they don't want them they don't want them no and then to boot we're hearing they don't even work right so I mean I guess that's where we're at and it's discouraging to hear here and um I don't know I don't know what the solution is but it's not the outside meter with a 15% the inside with a 15% discount it's not going to just just a point of point of clarity uh Madam chair um I was told and I guess the superintendent could tell me if I'm wrong that this program is ending and that people are going to have to stop using these outside meters that's why the half dozen seniors I know went to the expense to put these inside meters in now if I'm incorrect with that then perhaps the superintendent can tell me that so counselor um we have yet to determine an actual date that we're going to stop taking the reads on these outside irrigation meters but there will be a a drop so so let me stop you for a second so if you uh had a meter a plastic one of those outside meters and it broke you can't get another one and your only option is to put a hard meter in in the house correct the option we're now providing is just the internal right within a short period of time probably those meters will no longer be accepted and can no longer be used to deduct off your IR Y and as residents come in with the broken meters we're making it clear that they are going to have to move forward with this new Direction this is this is the new route we're taking the safer more it's it's just the right way to go this is all all the communities are going these internally Plum meters we can keep track of the data we can send a bill by the way the this is a this is a separate water build than your current the irrigation um meters are built separately that that's why it doesn't show up as a deduction on your water bill yeah so I think I think that because of I've had it so long it's not it's not showing up as a as a separate meter I'm getting one bill that that's something I can take care of on my own well you just you just explain to me what's happening with my bill I haven't had time to to deal with it I'm dealing with my constituents instead of myself I can't worry about myself okay in in reality it should be two separate bills one for your interior use one for your exterior okay great thank you okay thank you anyone else wish to speak what is the will of the committee I don't have a problem leaving it in committee till we get more information on what the plan of the mayor and the city and the DPW and what what how we're going to go about ending the current program and what uh benefits were going to help the seniors that do get meters put in uh so I would be I would be happy to leave this in committee if it's the will of the body okay the will of the committee is to leave it into committee thank you um this concludes the Elder affair is September 23rd meeting thank you --------- ##VIDEO ID:0SxQttGvxJs## it's on it's on check good evening welcome to the city of Riv September 3r Ways and Means Committee all rise to salute the flag pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all well call of the members of the ways mean subcommittee councelor agenzio here here councel Kelly here here councel nelski here here councelor buo here here and chairman sylvestri here here corm is present we have two items on tonight's agenda the first is Council order 24- 174 this is a motion presented by councilors Haro and councelor Gino SAA that the city council ordered to a public hearing an ordinance further amending the revised ordinances of the city of Rivier establishing a program to divert waste from landfills and incinerators to offset waste disposal costs okay counselor good evening good evening me L stre take your time uh thank you uh chairman syester for putting this on the agenda for today um so the ordinance here in question is a composting pilot program that we are trying to do in the city of river sorry two seconds um um so the composting pilot program would do a few things so for folks at home who haven't uh heard about composting composting is a food scrap disposal program that turns the food scraps into a usable byproduct usually for farming or for ah thank you usually for farming um or for gardening and it really enriches the soil um composting has really important environmental effects um in that all of our food scraps end up in a landfill and uh as they decompose they create uh gases that are five times more potent than methane gases and truly um um detrimental towards the environment they create Greenhouse emissions and effects that contribute to climate change about 50% of all municipal waste around the country is composable waste so from homes 50% of that is compostable waste and of all waste about 30% is composable material um composting um is usually a lot more cost effective than especially at scale it's a lot more more effective um uh sorry cost efficient than regular than regular or regular waste program um and so this ordinance does a few things first of all it starts the pilot it's a absolute 100% optin pilot so for those of us watching at home what that means is you get it only if you want it okay we also ask the mayor in this program to create um an RFP and in in this RFP we ask uh him to work with whoever the people who bid on it to do a few things create a a sliding scale for uh for the cost of this program so if you decide to opt in which again is 100% voluntary uh we ask the company and the city to work together to to figure out a sliding scill so if you're a three-digit household maybe you pay a little bit but if you're on a fixed income um you're on social security or anything like that maybe you pay z uh little to none um and we ask essentially Administration to create that sliding scale um additional cost for this is so I've been having some conversations with the administration and they're already considering something like this except the ordinance really structures it in a way so that um so that we can uh structures it in a way so that we can do the RFK and then potentially scale up to to a place that really makes sense um right now a few months ago the city council approved $25,000 of yearly mitigation money from our current waste disposal provider uh and my last conversation with r rck risque and my initial conversations with r for with r Rick visque um that money they want to put it towards the compost program so we can go um we can put it that way now the ordinance does ask for a little for a lot more than that and I'm happy to talk numbers and and have additional conversations about that uh but that's because we also want the city to apply for federal and state granting there's a lot of money out there honestly we could probably fund a full-fledged City compost program if we applied for all the grant money that exists for composting uh but we want to do baby steps we want to really scale it up make sure the residents are feel comfortable with it um and so we want to make sure but we do ask for 125 so the 25 that we have for from the excuse me from the the mitigation money and then another 100 in hopes that the administration will apply for this grant funding I know we just approved a sustainability manager so hopefully they can work on that and maybe we tear it so that when the money comes in that's where we put it to play but at the very least get the program started with 25,000 now back of the uh number um back of the number um estimates on what this would cost per person or P per house household right I have a composting program right now in my home I pay $4 $44 a month for that they come once a week and they retrieve my compost they give me a fresh new bin um so if we had I think it's 0 to 20 residents in the entire zero 50 residents in the entire city opt into this program we could essentially cut that monthly cost per household to like $20 of course if we scale up more we can cut it down more significantly and really um make sure to get more bank for our buck but the goal is really scaling up I think that if we're going to see the cost benefits of um at least balancing our waste disposal program uh we need to get to scale um so this this program also does allocate some of this money this ordinance also allocates some of this money towards um like a education campaign with our residents so that they can sign they can know about it um and that's an aggressive education campaign because again the more people we sign up the cheaper it's going to be for the city for this pilot and then we can scale that up if we wanted to expand it to the whole city um some of the things and some concerns we've heard at the climate and sustainability subcommittee meeting initially was um was how the program actually works so let me dispel some myths uh this would not be a program that lives under our DPW Department okay we would be contracting out this work like we do with our waste disposal program okay um the composting happens in a way you put your food scraps from your kitchen into a bucket uh with a with a tight lid right and that gets picked up once a week um now I've never had a program I never had an issue with a rodent or any other animals trying to get into my bucket and again it's just not there long enough for someone to try to get into it because by the time I have a lot of food in there I'm getting a fresh new bucket at the end of at the end of the week right or once a week okay this gets picked up at your homes once a week um and so there there's that the other piece that I heard there were some concerns about water quality most of the people that do this work in Massachusetts are composting their their are doing their composting facilities off the ground uh and they're they're turning their their compost off the ground it's we're not we're not rural enough and it doesn't make enough sense for people in the Greater Boston region to compost in a way um where like this would be going into Farmland now when the when the fertilizer uh ends up on the ground it's usually like over concrete out of some facility nearby um usually there's some in Malden there's some in Medford there's some all over uh the city of the the Greater Boston region um so th that's kind of the rundown the skinny I know it took a while and thanks for uh your gra being gracious to wait for me uh but that's kind of the skinny on the composting ordinance that we have before us and I'll take any questions Council zuro uh thank you Mr chairman uh I'm certainly going to support sending this to a public hearing I have a lot of problems with it I have a lot of problems with coming up with an extra 100,000 I don't even know that the in the contract the mayor has complete discretion over what to do with that 25,000 uh from from the mitigation money from the waste carrier uh so I'll never I'll never refuse sending something to a public hearing I want to have a lot of discussion on this later but not here at this meeting meeting at the subcommittee meeting uh after it goes to a public hearing I I'm I'm not against composting I'm against uh jumping into something with uh both feet when we can start a pilot program through the mayor's office and uh there's a lot of discussion about it and we we can have all those after the public hearing and when it goes into whatever committee it get sent to but I will I will support it going to a public hearing thank you Council than you if I may just say this is a pilot program and I think to scale this up to a major program it'd be millions of dollars and uh I hear you on the money front I think you know that's something we can discuss maybe we tiar in how we bring in the extra 100 and the reason why I actually put a figure here to your point councelor zambuto is that um that I understand that we need to allocate the money from the mitigation at least that's the way I I I've been told although you know the Mayors people see it differently but I'd like it to be before us because before you because right now I'm a private citizen I promise um unfortunately cont contracts dictate what we can do I happen to be familiar with the waste contract because uh I'm I've been dealing with waste zero people for years and uh you know independently on that like I said you know we got the mitigation money um and we want to at least run it by the council and and make sure that happens that way thank you any thank you questions councilen thank you Mr uh I'm in full support of this I mean certainly for the environmental aspects alone uh composting is a great thing I know there's people in my neighborhood uh like councelor Haro that are already a part of this program because I see those buckets out and I've and I've spoken with them it's a pilot program it's completely voluntary to opt in you know I think if it does catch on there is the potential for some savings uh taking some uh trash out of our wa stream so I'm very interested in it I I think it's the wave of the future uh of course we have to look at the costs but uh I certainly want to go to a public hearing and and look into this more but uh initially I I am in favor of it thank you councelor jio yeah and you know some of the things on the um on the cost savings yeah of course we have to scale up one of the things this ordinance also does is we collect some data on um on exactly or we asked the mayor to collect data on if we scale this up based on the program of the amount of people that have opted in um how much money would we actually be saving per pound on waste disposal and so that's another important part of this ordinance I don't know I haven't seen a plan from the mayor and I think that we can get ahead of it as this Council you know I know we're Forward Thinking folks and get ahead of it and actually just come up have a plan right and uh that data piece is important for that thank you I think it seems like the will of the council to send this to a public hearing oh sorry Council McKenna I just um have a concern Mr chairman about this because um I think if we open it up to the city I'm afraid that it's uh residents are going to compost in back of their yards and uh that it it's you know it's a potential uh negative impact on on uh people because it it attracts unwanted pest uh rats and um smells can be uh you know uh passed on to neighbors so that's that's my only problem with this so thank you thank you anyone else Angela Gino so um my idea I was thinking about this a lot since we put in this motion and I really want to start it in the school I really want the schools to start with the composting because not only can they be used as a science program for for their class they can actually use it as as as a as a course um I know that they started something like this in Salem Massachusetts and it's been working and they've ended up getting a lot of money a lot of funding because the students began the composting program so maybe we can add this to the motion to the ordinance at some point just to have have the pilot program stop within the school system thank you thank you good evening councilor Tom scosi chief of planning Community Development for the city um since it was noted a few times what the mayor's office plans were to spend the the funding that we currently have and the funding we're looking to get to create a pilot program on composting I just wanted to touch on it just for a moment um so a few things that we've been working on since that funding was secured um first and foremost we're trying to figure out exactly how the procurement would work um because depending on which model we take it could get kind of complicated so you know for example if we were to put some money towards purchasing starter kits for everyone that wanted to get involved in the program it's much simpler from a procurement standpoint than subsidizing user costs or paying the company directly to do something like that so we've been trying to figure out and look at all the other communities that have done it to make sure we're going to do it right um we've talked with all of the major providers of this service within the the Boston metro area um both to get a sense of what the products are that they the end product they create where the waste goes also from a cost standpoint um some of them can be as much as 40 a month some can be as little as 20 on a sliding scale going down to 12 bucks a month if if you've got enough people enrolled in the program so we wanted to get a good sense of what was out there from that standpoint um and then we have been aggressively looking at opportunities to expand the impact beyond the 25,000 we have uh we recently submitted a USDA Grant application for $137 or I promise you it's more than that $137,000 um which would really take that pilot program to scale and allow us to subsidize low income participants in the program and have a lot of the Outreach and marketing work that councelor Haro had mentioned that I think has to be a part of this program um there's also an EPA grant that just got released on a rolling basis which we'll also be applying for and then through D there's a program called smrp um which um as the councelor had mentioned we have a new sustainability manager abak Kaze who started a few months ago and has really been digging into this stuff and he'll be meeting with DP actually tomorrow to talk about what we can do to get in enrolled in that program so all these together could help us get the necessary funding to take this pilot project to scale and make sure it's run successfully um I think it's a bit difficult for us to ascertain exactly what that amount would be on a yearly basis because of all these grants being kind of competitive and the funding might change from one year to the next which is why maybe a set number is a bit complicated but we're doing doing everything within our power to take a program to scale and to accomplish a lot of the same objectives outlined here I think it's Devil's probably just in the details as to how we get there thank you Tom um permission to speak in the chair thank you um I I just one question I I think to clarify for everyone so the city's not actually looking to to get in involved in the composting in itself we're looking to find a a third party to come in and do our composting for us correct exactly and that's a good question and and no other no people will be doing it on their own in their yards as far as the council had concerns of of people using the compost in their their own yards I mean right so some of the um companies you could work with provide you an end product which is the actual compost you'd spread on your lawn but in terms of getting from A to Z you know I I can speak as a a user of composting services and and the whole rodent aspect of it I I used to every week go out because I had a couple raccoons they still live in my neighbor's house it's a long story I'll tell you sometime um but they would tear up all of our garbage bags and i' I'd have just food laying all over my street since I started composting I haven't had that problem because it's actually an locktite container it's it's much better contained and secure so for for me at least in our neighbors it's it's helped to avoid some of those issues yeah I got to be honest um I took pictures just today of my trash barrels cuz today's trash day and uh as I was bringing my barrels out um the rodents have have managed to figure out the weakest part of the barrel they they lean over the side they cla a hole into the barrel and they get in and out of there and composting or not it doesn't matter if you use trash bags or not once you open that lid there's trash everywhere food so anything to help curb that I I think is is a good idea um so I I I think it's a positive and and we can only look into it and and see how far it can go so again I think it's the will of the body so I think we should take it to roll if else okay so this will be a recommendation to send this the committee to a public hearing next item is Council order 24-23 motion presented by councelor agenzio that the city council ordered to a public hearing an ordinance amending metered rates of the revised ordinances of the city of R councelor thank you Mr chairman uh the reason I brought this up uh there aren't a lot of homes that fall into this category there's probably 40 to 50 and I think that we should give a little bit of relief to these owner occupied four five and six families we're always talking about absentee landlords the they live out of the city they live out of the state um people send their rent checks and uh things happen at these homes um and we have a lot of problems with them I think this is a little benefit to these residents that take care of their four five and six family homes they're there they watch out for it and I think It ultimately benefits the City by having somebody living there and uh they pay a residential tax rate um so why not a residential water rate that was my reason for it thank you thank you counselor Council Kelly thank you um I guess the issue that I have with this is um collecting rents on a six family residential property pulls in a hefty amount of rent um and some would argue the profit on that rises to the level of a commercial business um so for that I have trouble supporting this however that being said it would be something that I could support if the owner occupant of these residential buildings were senior citizens over the age of 65 so um I would like to offer that amendment to this motion um so that the only time that this would be applicable is that if the building were owned by senior citizens over the age of 65 thank you thank you councelor councelor zambo thank you Mr chairman um this is we're we're going to be voting to send this to a public hearing I believe correct uh again I'm not going to block it from going to a public hearing I have a lot of problems with this I want to know the numbers I want to know exactly how much money this is going to cost the city uh I want it extrapolated out we'll do that in committee I'm sure after it comes to a public hearing but uh I uh I'm not a hard no but I'm I'm a a very tough years so it'll be a it'll be u i it'll be the numbers that tell me what I'm going to do and how I'm going to vote so I I do support it going to a public hearing thank you thank you councelor um thank you Mr uh chairman I would be amenable to uh councelor Kelly's uh suggestion that uh it goes to senior citizens 65 and older I think that's the group that you know we most are concerned about so I would be amendable to that uh to that Amendment thank you Council and councel thank you C irid noski 53d Home Street uh I have to think about you know I definitely would want to take care of our senior citizens but I also would want to take care of anybody that's disabled that may have uh that issue uh but just so you know um I can tell you out of this four uh family buildings there's 34 in the city there's uh five and the five family homes there's 10 and six family homes is 12 so it's a total of 5 six total in the whole city uh on my own particular issue uh with four families it costs about $2,000 extra a year would go from commercial to residential and like Council renzio said you if those these folks have residential tax rates why are they paying commercial water rates and just as a little history back in 20 8 when this was passed uh the the three family number of the cut off was just arbitrary it was just by the city auditor back then I talked to him he says there was no Rhyme or Reason we picked three um and the council didn't even look at the numbers as far as uh how it would affect the other residential rates so uh you know if he had he said if he had to come up and talk about it he would uh even though he doesn't work for the city anymore but I can tell you that in Ward one we have nine four family one five family and 3 six family in W two we have 14 four family six five family and nine six family and w three there's six four family one five family and no six families and W four is one four family and one five family and W five there's four four family and one five family and W six there's one four family and one five family so that's the breakdown from the different Wards uh of course W 2 is the most dense Ward and the most uh built up as far as uh the number of multif family homes so that's why there so many people in War I so uh one of the things that came up was uh you know how would the city pay for it well I know uh out of these most of them are senior citizens several are disabled and some are under 60 so uh but and they live in this you they have to live in the city because they're run they on the city rols so uh I would ask that we we send it to the council send it to a uh public hearing and we'll hear what the people have to say when it comes up thank you thank you counselor and um I believe it's the will of the council to move this to public hearing so we will do with a positive um so son to the council positive motion thank you and that will be the end of business for this s's Ways and Means Committee e