ORDER-2020-89 : City of Melrose Operating Budget for Fiscal Year 2021 in the amount of $88,397,961.08 (Eighty-Eight Million, Three Hundred Ninety-Seven Thousand, Nine Hundred Sixty-One Dollars and Eight Cents).

Transcript (~1 h 5 min @ 8:53)

Speakers identified by voice; unnamed voices are numbered within this recording. Auto-caption text — verify against the video.

▶ 8:47 Christopher Cinella: Thank you. Our first order of the evening 2020-89, which is the City of Melrose operating budget for fiscal year 2021, the amount of $88,397,961.08. I hear from a couple of parts of this, the first step of the budget is 121, the mayor's office. I believe we have the Chief of Staff, what do you do?

▶ 9:16 Speaker 1: I just brought him in, Patrick.

▶ 9:18 John N. Tramontozzi: A motion to suspend the rules so we can hear from the appropriate administration personnel.

▶ 9:24 Christopher Cinella: Second. A motion to suspend the rules by Councilor Tramontozzi, seconded by President Grigoraitis. If you'd call the roll.

▶ 9:32 Speaker 1: Councilor Migliorelli. Yes. Councilor Tramontozzi. Yes. Councilor McMaster. Yes. Councilor McNaught. Yes. Councilor Eccles. Yes. Councilor Garipay? Yes. Councilor Stewart? Yes. Councilor Thomas? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. President Grigoraitis? Yes. Chairman Sinella? Yes.

▶ 9:59 Christopher Cinella: 11 yes. Well, our rules are now suspended and if you'd like to

▶ 10:06 Speaker 4: say a few words about your budget.

▶ 10:10 Speaker 5: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

▶ 10:12 Speaker 6: And thank you to the council. for hearing me with your suspension of your rules.

▶ 10:17 Speaker 5: My name, for those of you watching at home, my name is Patrick Pendergast.

▶ 10:20 Speaker 6: I serve as Mayor Broder's Chief of Staff.

▶ 10:24 Speaker 5: I joined the administration

▶ 10:27 Speaker 6: most of the way through November following the election and previously for the five years prior, has served as a legislative aide and then staff director for who's then State Representative Broder. Throughout that period, serving Melrose has been a major privilege and a pleasure to see what a tight-knit community is capable of in both good times and challenging times.

▶ 10:55 Speaker 5: The job before us was certainly nothing

▶ 10:57 Speaker 6: that we imagined even the first tech office and COVID-19 even turned that on its head.

▶ 11:05 Speaker 5: The budget that the mayor has presented to you

▶ 11:07 Speaker 6: leaves many options on the table for us as we work our way through what the financial impacts both on the residents and on the city financially would be as a result of the crisis. Our office, and I'm here to speak to you tonight on a couple of matters you agree, I believe. Mayor's office, the Disability Commission and the community events line item.

▶ 11:35 Speaker 6: Our office is arguably fairly simple and I'm happy to review from the outset the highlights.

▶ 11:47 Speaker 6: Mayor's salary is set by the city charter,

▶ 11:49 Speaker 5: as you're all aware. That leaves room for two staffers.

▶ 11:55 Speaker 6: Currently, we have a mayoral assistant

▶ 12:00 Speaker 6: who is pivotal in both communications as well as clerical work for the office

▶ 12:04 Speaker 5: and my role as chief of staff.

▶ 12:12 Speaker 5: In prior administration, my role had been titled Director of Community Services or Operations

▶ 12:15 Speaker 6: and Operations. We felt that chief of staff was a little more appropriate for the work we were trying to

▶ 12:24 Speaker 6: get done, but many of the same duties and probably a couple others are still on my plate. So you'll see an overall reduction.

▶ 12:43 Speaker 6: in the salary line. Moving on to printing, we anticipate printing to be last year.

▶ 12:48 Speaker 5: Printing covers everything from business cards to stationery, which does add up for new registration. We also do posters throughout the year, letterhead we've

▶ 13:02 Speaker 6: done in the past, prior administrations have done kindergarten buttons for the

▶ 13:07 Speaker 5: incoming kindergarten class. Some of these traditions are things we intend to

▶ 13:15 Speaker 5: continue with, other ones we are reviewing. There is an expense account for the mayor.

▶ 13:18 Speaker 6: The mayor is not eligible to receive reimbursement for mileage, etc., and other

▶ 13:24 Speaker 5: out-of-pocket expenses that he incurs in his duties, which are 24-7. This account

▶ 13:33 Speaker 6: to flex that and this remains stable for a year. We also employ, we do not have a full-time

▶ 13:44 Speaker 6: receptionist. We are able to employ receptionists part-time and also utilize our valued senior volunteers as well as seniors who are working as part of the tax work off program. For those

▶ 14:00 Speaker 6: hours that we can't find somebody we do have a receptionist who helps manage the

▶ 14:07 Speaker 5: inflow of calls and traffic into the office. We pay dues and memberships to two major organizations, the Massachusetts Municipal Association as well as the

▶ 14:14 Speaker 6: Metropolitan Area Planning Council. I think many of you are familiar with the work both of these organizations do. Much of the support they offer the city probably goes unheralded, but they're especially effective in connecting us to

▶ 14:30 Speaker 6: grant opportunities, technical assistance, and really getting the city to think in

▶ 14:36 Speaker 5: a more regional or statewide approach. We don't have to always reinvent the wheel,

▶ 14:38 Speaker 6: so our membership in those organizations has proved to be very valuable so far in this administration.

▶ 14:53 Speaker 6: Occasionally, it's education or travel or seminars is required. Registration for those conferences is covered under the next line item, and that allows us to attend

▶ 15:05 Speaker 6: the seminars and events that these organizations and others host. Lastly, and probably most significantly, you see is the community outreach line. This covers

▶ 15:18 Speaker 6: Many things. Obviously, you're well aware of the fact that COVID-19 has significantly curtailed our impact, our ability to support these events

▶ 15:25 Speaker 5: in the past. These events have included Healthy Melrose, the Memorial Day Parade, Senior Sign Up Day, where we offer an opportunity for seniors in Melrose

▶ 15:34 Speaker 6: to access all the different relief programs

▶ 15:38 Speaker 5: that the city's made available to them. Our administration has used this money

▶ 15:47 Speaker 5: for pizza parties for um kids who've accomplished various achievements um events that are celebrating our residents at our city parks um a kindergarten welcome party we contribute to various chamber

▶ 16:01 Speaker 6: events uh one of the ten this also operates the kids club always popular kids club um that helps

▶ 16:07 Speaker 6: break down isolation between new families and gives kids a chance to see each other.

▶ 16:12 Speaker 5: This money has also gone into supporting intergenerational prom, which we unfortunately

▶ 16:21 Speaker 6: had to cancel this year because of COVID, and various musical and arts events. So,

▶ 16:24 Speaker 5: all that being said, that is the kind of intent behind that account. It is vital to, you know,

▶ 16:31 Speaker 6: know create the events and memories and sorts of outreach that make Melrose the

▶ 16:38 Speaker 5: special place that it is that really get people into our city parks and into some

▶ 16:47 Speaker 5: of the areas of the city they may not normally look at how we proceed I think

▶ 16:52 Speaker 6: you like I can imagine many many different applications of how we will

▶ 17:02 Speaker 6: need to facilitate that same outreach during and after where we are now and are getting out of this

▶ 17:07 Speaker 5: um and so while some of those things are not stapled down right now in terms of dates and

▶ 17:14 Speaker 5: events because i don't know anybody who can predict those things the need will be there

▶ 17:17 Speaker 6: and so we are looking uh we're excitedly looking for opportunities to facilitate community to help grow those connections um in a safe and purposeful way um that's what i believe

▶ 17:37 Speaker 6: unless i'm mistaken that should cover this particular item on this side and we'll open

▶ 17:39 Christopher Cinella: it up for questions um first in the queue is council tramitose yes uh thank you thank you

▶ 17:47 John N. Tramontozzi: mr chairman and uh thank you mr print the gas for uh for being with us as we begin the budget hearings just a couple comments for us please as we review each city department budget going forward we must

▶ 18:02 John N. Tramontozzi: be mindful of the city's finances and our ability to sustain spending during this unprecedented time involving the COVID-19 pandemic is that the feedback is that coming from anybody

▶ 18:28 Speaker 1: John I think you're the only person speaking so I think it's coming on your end

▶ 18:32 John N. Tramontozzi: All right. I'll try to adjust my volume. The bottom line is that the fiscal issues of the city will be challenging. That's not my words. That's the mayor's words. Here's what we do know. The mayor has presented us with a budget that he says doesn't rely on any federal dollars. That's good because we know we are not likely to get any federal money. We also anticipate that there will be a 12.5% decrease in the amount of unrestricted local aid from the state. That's unfortunate. It could be more, I suspect, and it will be. I recently attended a Massachusetts Municipal Association webinar where the state's fiscal year 2021 budget looks grim. I quote grim, that's the words they use. $4 to $6 billion reduction in revenues, and the state will need to tap into its rainy day fund to bail itself out and they certainly will do that the question is what is it going to what's going to be necessary to bail out the municipalities and cities and towns the bottom line is that we are all in this together and I'll be asking each department head to provide us with options especially in the area of possible reductions to some of their budget items as you all know I had put in request to the to the administration for some information they did provide some I appreciate that and I thank you I thank the mayor for providing us with some of the additional information I requested although I know it was difficult and not yet possible to put together that spreadsheet that I requested but we will proceed in any event and try to move forward with what we have with that in mind also I do

▶ 20:28 John N. Tramontozzi: appreciate the opportunity to ask some questions and certainly every other counselor will have the opportunity as well as a point of order I would just suggest we hold off on making any motions to recommend before everybody has an opportunity to make any motions to amend any of the budgets that they choose to do so mr. Prentice I just have a couple questions for you one in

▶ 21:04 John N. Tramontozzi: particular on your line item there's one that says when the salary item what is

▶ 21:25 Speaker 5: can you explain what sick leave incentive is so my understanding I would

▶ 21:29 Speaker 6: like to confer with marianne long our director of human resources before uh giving you a final

▶ 21:39 Speaker 5: answer counselor but um my understanding is that it is a it is an incentive for us to uh

▶ 21:41 Speaker 6: not use all of our sick leaves uh in a particular fiscal year municipal employees can build up a

▶ 21:49 Speaker 6: tremendous amount of sick leaves each each year and carry it over year to year based on the policies by the municipality or the state. My understanding is that this incentive is a payout on an annual basis so that the liability facing the city, if the employee were to leave city municipal employment, would not be as great. That's my understanding and I can certainly

▶ 22:15 John N. Tramontozzi: confirm that. Right. So it sounds to me like it's an incentive program, not that the city might offer some of its employees or all their employees, that that they don't use this personal time off or sick leave, they can buy it back in effect or they get compensated for that. As you may know, in the private sector, we don't necessarily have all that. Some businesses, if you don't use your sick leave time, you lose it by the end of the year. So that's a little bit of an item that I think we might have some room negotiate on and I'm considering trying to see if we can reduce that if not eliminate it I trust that the city employees they do they they're hard working people and that if they are sick for any reason that their work can be covered for us but again we need to be mindful of the city spending as we're going forward is there this the the total appropriated amount for that right

▶ 23:27 John N. Tramontozzi: now is one thousand two hundred fifty dollars correct that's correct okay can I assume also that there isn't has not been no layoffs or furloughs as a result of the code of COVID-19 in the mayor's department not that I'm aware of no

▶ 23:42 John N. Tramontozzi: you're still employed the mayor is as well as assistance great thank you

▶ 23:48 John N. Tramontozzi: cut out halfway through then you'll know all right one other thing to community outreach the mayor's office does provide great programs for the city and I we all appreciate that but in light of the fact that some of these programs have been reduced or eliminated because of the COVID-19 situation we're experiencing is there any room that give us help us because I can see where we can eliminate or reduce that a community outreach item

▶ 24:25 Speaker 5: against I guess what I would suggest is that probably right now to the amount of money in that line item and I was remiss in neglecting to mention that long before COVID-19 when the mayor first took office he was very interested in piloting a participatory budgeting program and we had tossed around figures for that ultimately we landed at $5,000 and that's why you'll see that increase in the community outreach line the hope was to give students of high school age in Melrose the opportunity to allocate that money directly and to launch a program in tandem with a lot of the work that the mayor did as state representative to pass statewide mandated civics education to give students the opportunity to manage a piece of the city budget so they'd have a stake in the uh the outcomes of your deliberations and the work

▶ 25:29 Speaker 5: that we do uh we have the administration um that work can certainly go on remotely and i guess to answer and so thank you for for letting me get back to that piece to explain that that particular increase but to answer your question generally and submit that for the relatively low amount of money that is in this line item and the huge need for community right now given the fact that we can't see each other in the way that we used to um the need is there more now than ever um to

▶ 25:58 Speaker 5: facilitate the same sort of results of the programs that previous administrations were able to invest in. I also anticipate that when we, I'm sure you saw today that the governor has entered us into a phased approach for reopening. As we enter later phases, there will be significant need to facilitate use of some of our street space for downtown businesses and in some of our other business districts we're going to have to have more events to get to jump start um you know our local economy and make sure that we some of these uh merchants are able to recoup their losses there'll also be a need for more community events people haven't seen each other and these events will be complicated because they're going to require social distancing they're going to they may require having temperature taken etc and for me that looks like yes communications getting the word out but also budgeting for these events equipment infrastructure barriers table rentals overtime various city departments were required and so the budget we're submitting is fairly narrow because of the anticipated need for facilitating

▶ 27:22 John N. Tramontozzi: community moving forward none of that has been put into place yet obviously

▶ 27:28 Speaker 5: right as of now we're just monitoring the situation as it unfolds but as we

▶ 27:32 Speaker 6: get to more stable plateaus of what life is going to be like it is our intention

▶ 27:36 Speaker 5: we've already was already in a couple meetings with some of the people in this

▶ 27:42 Speaker 6: meeting today about how we would facilitate those things so while it's a

▶ 27:49 John N. Tramontozzi: work in progress we're not there yet and it is a 37% increase in the prior budget do you think you really need that full amount to accomplish what you want to do

▶ 28:03 John N. Tramontozzi: yes okay all right thank you I'll route the firm further questioning to others

▶ 28:10 Christopher Cinella: thank you so we have a couple other people in the queue I just want to go run through the list real quick and then if I missed you raise your hand next up we have councillor Garipay and thomas president Grigoraitis councillor mcmaster did i miss anybody really okay that's a councillor Garipay

▶ 28:27 Mark Garipay: thank you chairman um thank you uh mr printer for being here thanks for the uh explanation going over line by line um you answered a lot of my questions um and um councillor amatozzi also asked the question regarding the community outreach I was also a little perplexed on the 37% increase and what was gonna question whether we should whether we can just still get by with what was budgeted at 13 13 5 understanding that we did we did not we did cancel a number of events this year and we're at 7,000. I appreciate your detailed explanation on that. I do have a quick question. I do notice that the salary has gone down 4.4% as a result of the last year, as a result of, I think we had that position was empty for a little bit last year, plus some new staff coming in uh what is the percent budgeted for raises don't need to know dollar amounts people but what is the percent um budgeted for for uh raises in uh in the mayor's

▶ 29:48 Speaker 7: office my understanding is zero okay thank you i'm all set thank you thomas thank you mr chairman

▶ 29:55 Cory Thomas: uh mr pentagrass welcome thank you for being here um again councils Garipay and Tramontozzi both touched on things that i wanted to talk about as well i did have a question about the sick leave incentive um have as the mayor's staff been accruing time during the covid work shutdown have they been telecommuting and have they been accruing their sick time

▶ 30:23 Speaker 5: uh as far as i know neither the mayor's assistant nor i have taken a sick day

▶ 30:33 Speaker 5: in 2020 okay and then we have been working beyond um we were working beyond full-time

▶ 30:39 Cory Thomas: before covid and i would say that has only increased so other city staff uh throughout you know the city government they're also um eligible for the sick leave incentive

▶ 30:47 Speaker 5: i can't answer that right now because i don't know the answer i can get back to you though

▶ 30:54 Speaker 5: if people have been telling me my guess is my understanding is yes the problem that we're trying to mitigate is you don't want an employee accruing over years and years and years all this sick leave and then it's time for them to retire leave and the city has to pay out all this money at the end that you have no idea when that employee is going to leave and so we put into place these incentive programs so that i'd rather get my money each year if i'm not going to use my sick leave so that the city's liability at the end you know to talk about some of those um unexpected costs that may happen at the end of the fiscal year this the programs like this mitigate that and i believe that they're in every department

▶ 31:38 Speaker 5: and available to every um every worker which which is to say it is not a thing that is unique to the mayor's office how that actually shakes out department department i can't speak specifically

▶ 31:48 Speaker 6: to right now but uh that one thousand two hundred dollars is there uh so that would incentivize us

▶ 31:56 Cory Thomas: to get rid of some of our sick days okay thank you do you have any idea of how many employees take advantage of that incentive during fy20 in the mayor's office in the mayor's office or across

▶ 32:08 Cory Thomas: city uh service no but i can get that to you okay that'll be great thank you so much

▶ 32:20 Jen Grigoraitis: thank you chairman snell and thank you mr prendergast for being here i just have two quick follow-up questions on what we've talked about so far i believe the first one will probably be for marianne long but is the sick leave incentive is that new this year or is that something that's been around and been incorporated in previous budgets and i'm assuming is possibly part of collective bargaining agreements with very various city unions i believe it's not you

▶ 32:42 Speaker 5: it's certainly not unique to this fiscal year and it's not unique to melrose and i do believe that

▶ 32:51 Speaker 6: it emanates from uh some of the benefits that collective bargaining has won for

▶ 33:01 Speaker 6: uh workers in in the city um and there are restrictions on differential treatment between union and non-union workers the mayor's assistant and i are not yet in a union thank you and then

▶ 33:12 Jen Grigoraitis: one more question on the additional five thousand dollars in community outreach that you talked about i just want to make sure my understanding is this would be a participatory budgeting pilot project where we would take students i'm assuming melrose high school students and have them actually engage in the process of taking a small amount of money and determining how to use it in the community is that i just want to make sure i understood your description that's almost exactly

▶ 33:35 Speaker 5: right it would be open to all uh all residents who are high school age in melrose um so we want

▶ 33:46 Speaker 6: to make sure that we capture students who have dropped out as well as students who attend other schools um and of course students who attend melrose high school but the idea is you might

▶ 33:57 Speaker 5: know um several other municipalities nationwide and probably most notably locally the city of cambridge as a city-wide citizen um participatory budgeting program um this is a very small pilot amount that you know we'd be able to teach the process of building coalition's advocacy moving through the budget process etc it would be a great

▶ 34:23 Speaker 6: opportunity for each of you to connect with students and teach them about your

▶ 34:26 Speaker 5: role as well as for them to feel like especially when national politics are

▶ 34:30 Speaker 6: the way that they are that they've got some purchase and say in how how their city is run and how politics unfold close to home thank you for that I have

▶ 34:48 Shawn M. MacMaster: no further questions McMaster Thank You mr. chairman mr. Prendergast it's customary when any department comes before us to provide a memo that's essentially a questionnaire the template that provides information so that we're not hearing about the details of a budget for the first time on the night of a budget hearing. And it helps, as I said, to put in context particular line items. In this case, I think it would have been particularly helpful for the 37% increase, despite what you've already testified this evening. Can you inform this council if there is any reason why we were not provided with a questionnaire on this budget, but also for the two other budgets that we will be um having come before us this evening the administration has been working

▶ 35:40 Speaker 6: on responding to the coven 19 pandemic the communications and process that we wanted to

▶ 35:46 Speaker 6: go through with the budget when the mayor first took office no longer became possible given the amount of time and resources we needed to expend to keep the city safe and functioning during this

▶ 36:01 Speaker 6: period. That having been said, we're doing our best to complete those customary questionnaires

▶ 36:07 Speaker 6: to get to you to explain in detail some of the nuances of the other departments.

▶ 36:17 Speaker 6: The items you have before you except for the areas that I've enumerated or described

▶ 36:25 Speaker 6: are almost unchanged from the last fiscal year so while regrettable it's a

▶ 36:32 Shawn M. MacMaster: situation that we're in thank you so if I understand it correctly Mr. Prendergast the intention going forward now that we are going into the step-down phase of this stay-at-home order would be to provide the council with advance notice in the form of a questionnaire or some type of accompanying memo to help us put in context the budgets that will be coming before us moving forward I understand that correctly I'd have to confirm with the mayor what kind of

▶ 36:58 Speaker 5: documentation he thought was best to supply to the council but certainly some

▶ 37:03 Speaker 6: level of documentation ahead of these meetings I think would be advantageous to each of you and to the folks at home I would appreciate that and I think many

▶ 37:10 Shawn M. MacMaster: of my colleagues would and I think so thank you and if you could perhaps let on this foot know what the intention is moving forward with respect to additional information. I would be thankful for that. Mr. Prendergast, Councilor Tramontozzi and Councilor Garipay asked you a bit about the community outreach line item, which as we've discussed is a 37% increase. Councilor Garipay also talked about the 4.4% decrease decrease in salary and wages in the mayor's, the mayor's budget for the mayor, for your office. Is there any possibility at all that community outreach money may go to compensate you or any other employee of the mayor's office for performing any community outreach tasks that

▶ 38:12 Speaker 5: be held in fy 21. my understanding is that would be uh illegal and in order to use funds in one

▶ 38:18 Speaker 6: particular item for another we would have to appear before you again authorization so the

▶ 38:21 Shawn M. MacMaster: intention is is it for to be used for the types of resources that you had uh mentioned after council the Chairman Tosi asked you questions not for stipends to work or staff events for the Mayor.

▶ 38:38 Speaker 5: Just put it affirmatively, my salary and the Mayor's assistant salary and the Mayor's salary

▶ 38:50 Speaker 5: will only come from the salary line. We will not receive monies from any other line. Thank you.

▶ 38:54 Shawn M. MacMaster: Thank you. My final question is with respect to the community outreach. How do we arrive at the actual number, the 5,000 increase? I realize and I think you do make somewhat of a good case for these needs that may be coming before the city as it relates to different types of events that may be held either related to COVID-19 or unrelated to COVID-19 where There may need to be some type of community health measures put in place, and that seems well-founded. The concern I have is not knowing what that might look like. The number seems arbitrary to me. It just seems to be a number without some attempt to budget what some of those costs might look like. And I understand we're not going to know exactly what those costs are, but all it is is it's an increase at 37% without something that explains what those potentially could be and how we arrive at that cost and I just I have some trouble voting to increase anything in light of where we are in this economy and the impact that it's having on the city in the state without a better sense of how we're coming up with any type of increase so the question is how do we arrive at that 37% increase from a budgeting perspective is that number arbitrary or is it based on something that we don't have before us this evening well I think

▶ 40:37 Speaker 5: it's a third option I think that the five thousand additional dollars that we

▶ 40:41 Speaker 6: are requesting you appropriate is for the mayor's pilot program for participatory budgeting for students of high school age that reside in the city of Melrose I think a large percentage of the increase will be based on that the rest of the budget is based on last fiscal year's outreach and again

▶ 41:08 Speaker 5: if we need to shut down let's say we are allowed to open up restaurants but restaurants have to be open at a reduced capacity and we determine that we are able to shut down parts of main street to the vehicular traffic so that we can facilitate

▶ 41:29 Speaker 5: those restaurants having that space um how much are tables going to cost and who's the appropriate authority person or entity to rent them how much will overtime cost do we need jersey barriers or

▶ 41:39 Speaker 6: can we get away with a different type of barrier to close down the street if we're going to do

▶ 41:41 Speaker 5: this multiple weekends in a row will it be dependent on weather these are all and then Do we need to pay for graphics to be made? Do we need to pay for invitations? Do we need to pay for signage? Do we need to pay for investments in the website, things like that, to get people to become more aware of these programs, etc.?

▶ 41:58 Speaker 5: The city is facing an unprecedented challenge with COVID-19. I would hazard to say that any sort of estimation about getting quotes for budgeting for this outreach line would be extremely challenging because I'm not certain that we'd be able to stick to it. Because we don't know what the situation is going to be in a couple weeks, let alone a couple months. What we do know is that the community is going to have to bounce back. and this particular line item is key in getting the community back together uh and the businesses

▶ 42:45 Speaker 5: back up and running etc um so i i share your concern i wish that i could provide more detail

▶ 42:47 Speaker 6: about how we would spend each dollar but we're not in that position thank you mr prendergast

▶ 42:59 Christopher Cinella: thank you mr chairman that's all i have nice chair miguel rally thank you chairman uh thank

▶ 43:01 Leila Migliorelli: Thank you, Mr. Prendergast for being here tonight. Just to kind of continue on with this community outreach questioning, I don't know if this is a question or just a statement, but if year to date we've spent $7,000 in this line item, and it's due to the fact that we've had to cancel a number of events, it's safe to say that we're probably not gonna be in large groups for the first part of FY21. So just making an assumption based on the fact of last year's plus 5,000 in this new program, I sort of question that logic, but I do hear you that we might need additional funds for these community gatherings moving forward. I just don't know, you know, how would we know that that would come from the community outreach line? I just have some questions because I don't have the context from last year about what was spent and what will be spent moving forward. So that's more of a statement than a question. For the education seminars, those sound like they're for professional development conferences. Are you sure that those are gonna be, you know, continuing on in FY21?

▶ 44:06 Speaker 5: I'm not sure that they're going to be continuing on, certainly not in the traditional sense of a conference

▶ 44:11 Speaker 6: that everybody goes to a convention center to take.

▶ 44:19 Speaker 6: But I know that the mayor is eager to avail himself of every opportunity to learn more about how to bring better ideas back to Melrose. And I think that continues on. I'm not sure how many of the organizations that offer these will structure their fees moving forward.

▶ 44:36 Leila Migliorelli: Okay, yeah, my thought was probably that they might be lower if they're less in person costs, which then goes up to my question about the dues and memberships increase of 15%. Is that because more people are taking memberships like you and the mayor or is it increased membership fees?

▶ 44:52 Speaker 5: What is what's the fees have been increasing year over year for a long time now and it's only now that we're budgeting them appropriately.

▶ 45:00 Speaker 6: But MAPC and I may have both raised their fees.

▶ 45:03 Speaker 1: Thank you. That's it.

▶ 45:10 Jack Eccles: Thank you, Councilor Eccles. Thank you. Mr. Chairman. Thank you. Mr. for being here tonight. Um, just a little bit of question. I understand you might not have the full details for budgeting. Project fleshed out, but my impression of the Cambridge, which is obviously much larger than than 5,000 dollars, I believe it's a 1Million dollars. Is that they have 2 paid staff members who devote some of their time. to this project and a paid intern um are you expecting to run this out and will just yourself and maybe the mayor's mayor be overseeing it do you plan on involving other staff members just kind of where the bandwidth is going to come

▶ 45:52 Speaker 5: for running this project i think the um this particular project will be a collaboration between the um schools probably our state

▶ 46:00 Speaker 6: representative our state senator um several others our congressman

▶ 46:06 Speaker 5: Clark I am anticipating I'm counting on the majority of the work being executed through the mayor's office just me the mayor and the mayor's assistant and I'm

▶ 46:20 Speaker 6: hopeful for eager community partners to step up and help this project get off

▶ 46:29 Speaker 8: the ground all invited thank you that's all for me Thanks, Mr. Chairman.

▶ 46:33 Christopher Cinella: Councilor Jamaleddine.

▶ 46:35 Speaker 9: Good evening.

▶ 46:37 Maya Jamaleddine: Thank you for being with us, Patrick. My question is, during these community events, would the city be using any outsourced funds to make these events happen, such as businesses' contributions, or is it just these events would be just to support the businesses and we're not going to ask anything back from

▶ 47:04 Speaker 5: them? i think it's too early to say i think it depends on the event um in the past i have to imagine that most of these events were some combination of uh we're leveraging volunteer work donations from businesses purchases from other businesses uh and staff time on the city side i have to imagine that moving forward will operate in a similar manner um again the to be precise the point of this money is not um the point of this money is community outreach so

▶ 47:36 Speaker 5: that can be everything from socially distance playing on our play sets and and playgrounds and some sort of a celebration for kids to perhaps something involving the downtown moving forward we don't fully know right now we know that we're going to there's many ideas in the community and

▶ 48:00 Speaker 5: and that we're going to have to invest in a big way in getting Melrose to come back

▶ 48:02 Speaker 6: together when it is safe to do so.

▶ 48:09 Speaker 5: What those events look like and particularly how the funding for each is split up, I don't know, but I do know that we will leverage these dollars to the extent possible to make

▶ 48:21 Speaker 5: as much impact, positive impact, as we can.

▶ 48:24 Maya Jamaleddine: you and would is anyone is there any committee right now working on organizing or preparing for these planning for these events or is it just waiting to do form this committee mayor's economic development task force

▶ 48:43 Speaker 5: is broken out into a couple of different working groups that are looking at given much anticipated Baker directives we've received today how the city local Chamber of Commerce other organizations and businesses can partner to provide

▶ 49:04 Speaker 5: downtown merchants and merchants in our other business districts meanwhile many of these other events for instance healthy Melrose or the intergenerational spring fling prom these all have dedicated volunteer groups that have worked year after year after year to build these events and grow them once it

▶ 49:27 Speaker 5: is safe together again I hope and I anticipate that many of these groups will want to come back together to say we never got to have our event we want

▶ 49:35 Speaker 6: to have our event and I have to imagine that'll be a stressful but exciting time

▶ 49:44 Speaker 5: for the city and so no there is to answer your question it's just there's no centralized post COVID fun committee planning these things but there are cells of people working throughout the city as they always have on um trying to figure out how

▶ 50:00 Speaker 5: to innovate their planning and ideas around their traditional events and pitch some new ones but

▶ 50:07 Speaker 1: we're certainly always open to new ideas great thank you councilor stewart thank you mr chair

▶ 50:14 Robb Stewart: and thank you mr pendergast for being here tonight uh through the chair i just want to make a couple of comments based on what i've heard so far this evening uh on the zero percent raise i think that's commendable thank you for um recognizing the the situation that we're all in i appreciate that from the community services standpoint um i appreciate your um your explanation i believe that the the benefits of great way the risk on this light item because essentially the businesses are going to need this i think it's real important that when we have an opportunity to jump start the local community which is paramount to our downtown that we do this effectively and i think 18 5 is a very uh reasonable number to be able to help out in that regard so i i honestly don't see uh any issue in this i think it's going to be this is this is a line item i think from the standpoint of addressing the health of our community uh again you know even though we are in a budgetary crunch i think this is going to be really important for our community from the participatory budgeting uh i think it's a great idea reason being is our children have been impacted tremendously throughout the course of the year um i think they're going to come forward with a lot of great ideas and I think that this is a great way to re-engage and involve them from that all of the stress and strain that they've seen thus far this year so I plan on supporting this thank you mr. chair anybody else wishing to speak for

▶ 52:09 Christopher Cinella: first time or a second time council chairman tozy mute thank you um uh just to uh to return to visit

▶ 52:19 John N. Tramontozzi: the um sick leave incentive uh line item um it does appear on other budgets on other department budgets and i think we're going to need an explanation for that that i don't think mr print the gas can provide to us and that has to be given to us by i think marianne long would be the appropriate department person for an explanation um so and more importantly whether or not this is something that the city offers um is it something that is contractually required uh is it something that um that can be eliminated from departments uh i don't know the answer to that and i think we need to to at least get that answer um and and i would ask to the chairman that maybe we can visit revisit that item again as we visit the other department items because we're going to see it again so we should we should be able to get an explanation that's going to help us

▶ 53:34 Christopher Cinella: in our our deliberations on this that's thank you so what is the will of the committee for the

▶ 53:41 John N. Tramontozzi: budget 121. i see it i see council of mcmaster has his hand up council mcmaster you're on mute

▶ 53:51 Shawn M. MacMaster: thank you mr chairman just uh briefly i agree with council of trimantozi and i would just caution the council similar to uh how i did out of respect to everyone um most importantly out of respect uh the process into our constituents uh and this is the same point i tried to make from the superintendent came before us on the special education item as it related to the stabilization fund is voting on matters without all the information before us. This may be a budget that as it relates to community outreach that needs to be more than a 37% increase. Is $5,000 based on what Mr. Prendergast represented tonight even going to be enough? So the first problem is is that we don't know. And what Mr. Prendergast said was, he's not in a position to have the full details. But what I would suggest is other than what Mr. Prendergast testified tonight is, we don't really have any details, it's speculation. At first, there was discussion around the resources that are needed in light of COVID. It was temperature checks and Jersey barriers and cable rentals. And then we heard from Mr. Prendergast the $5,000 is for participatory budgeting. So if it's for participatory budgeting, what then is left for community events that relate to COVID, that relate to community health? So I would suggest that the item for community outreach may in fact need to be more than $5,000, but because there hasn't been an effort to provide some sort of line item budget, a budget within that line item, we don't know. Secondly, there's some speculation that the sick leave incentive is a buyback. We don't know that at all. It's called a sick leave incentive, at least in the line item. If it was a buyback, I think it would say buyback. To me, it sounds like an incentive that if you don't call in sick for six months or a year, that you receive a stipend. And I think we should know that. And I would also argue that that may be very appropriate for collective bargaining purposes. But as you heard Mr. Prendergast say, either he or the other employee in the mayor's office are members of a union. So the point being is, I don't feel like we have enough information on those two items in order to go forward on this budget tonight. And I would also suggest that if we do, we're setting a precedent for every budget that comes before us. I think we need to demand information. That information, I understand we're in the middle of a public health crisis, but this is a new council with nine new members and a new administration we should set the tone for the information that is provided to us because at the end of the day we're representing constituents will hold us accountable and I think it's due diligence that we should have more information before we go forward on this budget and based on that mr. chairman I would make a motion to hold the same

▶ 56:45 Christopher Cinella: committee we have a motion to hold in committee by councillor McMaster we have second second by councillor uh tramitose one discussion none madam clerk

▶ 57:03 John N. Tramontozzi: i see i see uh councillor garapace hand up

▶ 57:08 Mark Garipay: my apologies um mr fernandez is this information that you could get to us for uh for thursday's uh the thursday's meeting

▶ 57:18 Speaker 5: so is the um is the question whether or not i can produce a line by line budget for community outreach for fy 21 post covid plus clarification on what the sick leave incentive program is i can do sick leave incentive program that's i mean i can accomplish that i don't know if i can participate contemplate and maybe maybe the mayor could do it maybe the mayor could do it but i don't know if i could i could imagine how many block parties or events or or publications that

▶ 57:55 Speaker 6: the office was going to have to put out uh under the variety of circumstances that covid

▶ 58:00 Speaker 5: um would present us but i could certainly go back to my boss and see if he had any ideas

▶ 58:06 Mark Garipay: I was concerned about the 37% increase. You did shed quite a bit of light on that. I think I'm just following up on Councilman McMaster's question regarding the sick leave. I don't want to hold up the budget process, but if it's going to be something that's going to be coming up Wednesday again and Thursday, if we could hold it in committee, if this is something you can get us on thursday um you know i'd be be fine with holding it in committee if you think you can get us the information i don't wanna i don't wanna hold the i don't wanna hold the budget process up for this for this uh for this department but i think um i think the question's out there and i think um i think that we should have the information i'm i'm happy to do my best

▶ 58:52 Speaker 5: to get you information on the uh sick leave incentive but like i said um i i find it

▶ 59:06 Speaker 5: exceedingly doubtful um how anyone would even contemplate how to build a community outreach

▶ 59:10 Speaker 6: budget we don't know what kind of outreach is uh advisable health-wise or on what kind of calendar

▶ 59:17 Speaker 5: we just know that it has to happen and certainly the administration be eager to work with each of

▶ 59:20 Speaker 6: view get your ideas um to see how we could move forward uh but that would be exceedingly

▶ 59:25 Speaker 6: difficult if we don't have funding available to do it in the first place so yes on um on

▶ 59:32 Speaker 6: the incentive information um and i'm not i would need greater clarification what the project was on um projecting how a community is supposed to bounce back from covid19 through the community

▶ 59:48 Christopher Cinella: outreach thanks thank you councillor on discussion on this particular motion uh councillor stewart

▶ 59:53 Robb Stewart: thank you mr chairman uh as a suggestion mr prendergast uh as opposed to looking at individual budgeted events could you perhaps categorize um and take an initial cut and we all know that every forecast uh the first thing we know about forecasts is that they're wrong but they're an estimate uh and if we could have an estimate that categorized where you think that the money may be spent as we understand today i think that would be extremely helpful and useful

▶ 1:00:31 Christopher Cinella: to the community thank you anybody else on discussion for this particular motion

▶ 1:00:38 Cory Thomas: counselor thomas thank you chairman um the current motion from council mcmaster is that just for these four proposed agenda items tonight the one line item 121 121 not 692 at all

▶ 1:00:53 Shawn M. MacMaster: just for clarity through the chair motion is actually on the the budget itself because my questions are to the sick leave incentive and it's the community outreach so I don't have a problem with the salaries if the my if the will of the committee is for me to withdraw the motion as made and specifically make them to those two line items I'm happy to do so or if that can just be incorporated into the the motion made which I don't think I was specific on I'd be fine with that take direction from the chair on what what he refers to

▶ 1:01:29 Cory Thomas: concerns both the sick leave incentive I also read it as counselor McMaster does that it is an incentive it's not a buyback um you know and if we have you know 20 30 or 40 city employees that haven't used any sick time over the last eight weeks due to a stay-at-home you know a work order from staying at home to work um they are accruing sick time a lot of people might be eligible for this in in this coming year so i i too would like to see um what this incentive looks like and and find out who used this before it was in last year's budget as well

▶ 1:02:09 Christopher Cinella: and how many people qualified for it and used it last year we have a motion we're going to hold 121

▶ 1:02:16 Speaker 1: i believe councilman master clarified his motion was to hold in committee the budget but he was willing to based on the will of the committee withdraw that if the second withdraw should on if i'm correctly paraphrasing and then just specifically do line items is that

▶ 1:02:35 Shawn M. MacMaster: that correct council McMaster I would be fine with that and be interested on discussion through the chair if that's the will of the committee I prefer not to hold up salaries if we don't have to but if we can if the will of the committee is just to do it all on Wednesday or Thursday evening if this information can be provided we can hold the whole thing up we're meeting

▶ 1:02:58 John N. Tramontozzi: Wednesday and Thursday regardless just a point of order maybe what we can do is just hold the entire 121 until Thursday to start splitting out, splitting hairs on line items becomes convoluted. So we're not, I mean, the budget doesn't have to get approved until the end of June. So we have time. So there's no reason, we're not going to hold up somebody's salary. They were on last year's budget anyway. So I would suggest that the motion go forward as it is. And then we can get clarification. This can be returned to committee on thursday or we pull it from um when we talk about it because it's always it's going to be in committee it's going to stay in the committee we can always pull it forward so i think that would be the appropriate thing to do okay so your motion stays councillor mcmaster

▶ 1:03:46 Christopher Cinella: yes thank you mr chairman just to reiterate for the folks at home we're going to motion there's a motion made by council mcmaster to hold there's 121 uh budget seconded by council tramitose madam clerk if you could please call council Migliorelli

▶ 1:04:03 Speaker 1: does councillor Garipay have a question councillor Garipay

▶ 1:04:07 Mark Garipay: it's on point of clarification we are holding department 121 maya and we're moving forward with the other other three departments thank you yep thank you councillor

▶ 1:04:20 Speaker 1: Councilor Migliorelli? Yes. Councilor Tramontozzi? Yes. Councilor McMaster? Yes. Councilor McNaught? Yes. Councilor Eccles? Yes. Councilor Garipay? Yes. Councilor Stewart? Yes. Councilor Thomas? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. President Grigoraitis? Yes. Chairman Cinella? Yes. 11 yes to that.

▶ 1:04:48 Christopher Cinella: And do we have a motion?

▶ 1:04:54 Leila Migliorelli: get mr stankovich moved up yes i'd like to meet you yes i'd like to make a motion to move the

▶ 1:04:59 Christopher Cinella: human rights commission up so we're going to move we have a motion made by councilor migliorelli to move budget 544 human rights we have a seconded by councillor eccles clerk if you'd call the role

▶ 1:05:13 Speaker 1: council of migliorelli yes yes the tram and tozy yes councilor mcmaster yes mcnaught Yes. Councilor Eccles? Yes. Councilor Garipay? Yes. Councilor Stewart? Yes. Councilor Thomas? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. President Grigoraitis? Yes. Chairman Sinella? Yes. 11 yes. I will make the...

▶ 1:05:38 Christopher Cinella: And Madam Clerk, we have our council meeting needs to start by 8 15.

▶ 1:05:46 Speaker 1: Let me bring Mr. Stankovic in right now. There we go.

▶ 1:05:55 Speaker 8: Mike, can you hear us? I can. Okay.

▶ 1:06:00 Speaker 8: You have Mr. Stankovich. Please call me Mike. Thank you, Mr. Chair. My name is Mike Stankovich and I am the current chair of the Melrose Human Rights Commission. Thank you everyone for having me this evening and thank you for moving up. I appreciate it. Just a brief history. The Melrose Human Rights Commission is one of the oldest community human rights commissions in the Commonwealth. The commission was created in 1992 upon recognizing a clear and apparent need in our community. For over 27 years, our commission has worked to strengthen the local bonds in our city, fostering and cultivating a mutual respect and understanding of all viewpoints, while verifying for all observers the enriching nature a diverse population brings with it. Some of the best and enduring work we do is with and in support of other human rights commissions and other community groups. Our essential mission is twofold. Working to safeguard and advocate for our legal and social rights and helping our community to progress and transform individually in our collective relations.

▶ 1:07:01 Speaker 8: Our work includes investigating claims of unlawful discrimination and harassment, and either mediating where appropriate or referring claims to appropriate enforcement authorities, building and sustaining community relationships and partnerships and working to promote goodwill understanding of diverse cultures and awareness of human rights issues as some examples of our work in the last year we have worked with the melrose police department and the melrose public schools to address graffiti and public buildings while beginning an outreach to all the pto organizations to foster a relationship with our youngest residents we have started the kindness club in two elementary schools to showcase acts of kindness and the the momentum they build with respect to promoting understanding of our many diverse cultures cultures building on the interest and in support of the community iftar we held diwali a hindu celebration of light and pride a celebration of our lgbt community we received a grant from the foundation trust for a speaker series which unfortunately has been temporarily put on hold until the in-person events can begin again but we are planning a robust speaker series beginning in spring of 2021. We have created a subcommittee on fundraising and marketing so that we can expand our outreach and programming without having to ask the city for additional resources. We have created a recruitment subcommittee so that we can address the needs in our commission and be in a position to recommend to our mayor the candidates best suited to meet our needs. We have collaborated with businesses throughout Melrose who consistently and constantly step up to donate to our causes by giving them the recognition they deserve at our events, which will hopefully yield more business for them while also allowing our programming to expand without the need to request additional funding we have much more work to do and like all of us while the current pandemic initially stunted our progress we are innovating and transforming our programming to meet these times human rights do not stop in pandemics and neither will the purpose of our commission we must be resilient our commissioners infused with the new energy what i hope is soon to be newly confirmed commissioners chose not to sit idly by and wait for this pandemic to pass before we started our community events this year's pride celebration will look different than the previous two but we remain committed to our mission on sunday june 21st we'll be portraying an art project in the kiosk at city hall and encouraging residents to paint themselves prideful we are in the process of creating and building upon the virtual pop-up libraries around the city as well as streaming a read-aloud On Tuesday, June 23rd, we will be streaming several musical performances. On June 24th, we are in talks for a Drag Queen Story Hour. On June 25th, we are in the process of having virtual poem readings. On June 26th, we are attempting to partner with MMTV for a prideful movie event, bringing popcorn to the Melrose Public Schools so that those receiving meals can have an at-home movie night. And on Saturday, June 27th, we are organizing a Pride Car Parade through Melrose. these events will bring our community together while also promoting our core mission there is more that can be done interest and demand from the community and what this commission can and should be doing is increasing our expanded programming has in part been in response to that demand our expenditures have increased exceeding our three thousand dollar appropriation those expenses were covered by in-kind and small dollar dollar donations usually amounting to at least half as much as our allocated budget. We anticipate this trend continuing. We will continue to innovate during this pandemic to make sure our residents know that we remain committed to our cause and available to address their needs. Obviously our ability to fundraise during these difficult times but the need for our commission has not shrunk which is why I am asking this council to commit to keeping our funding the same it has been three thousand dollars and with it a promise that we will be good stewards of the funds we are allocated. we will continue to seek to expand our programming and outreach while simultaneously coming up with new ways to fund our commission our work is made possible through the dedication of our 11 volunteer public servants and many volunteers and partners in our community i would be remiss not thanking them for their commitment sacrifices and dedication thank you for your continued support and

▶ 1:11:12 Christopher Cinella: i welcome any questions thank you um we have counselor tramatosi up first i just want to be mindful of the time because we will have to bounce

▶ 1:11:24 John N. Tramontozzi: into city council thank you i'll be i'll be real brief michael i want to thank you for your service and uh and thank all the uh for the service of all the members of the uh your commission i think you uh you put together wonderful programming uh you're a fantastic um operation and i commend you and um and the other commissioners uh this is a balanced budget there's no increase from prior years uh and i support it wholeheartedly um and with that i'll i'll see if anybody else wants to comment thank you again michael appreciate it

▶ 1:12:00 Maya Jamaleddine: good evening michael and thank you so much for joining us i just want to support this budget and i want to thank you all for um um all the services you're providing to our community and um um when i say um i think all the uh counselors that uh served on this uh human rights commission mr being part of your team thank you president Grigoraitis are you looking for a

▶ 1:12:31 Jen Grigoraitis: motion to recess um it's yeah it's 8 13 i i think i'm making a motion to recess so that we can enter

▶ 1:12:41 Christopher Cinella: into the full council we also don't have any um other questions that are in queue and i don't

▶ 1:12:49 Jen Grigoraitis: know if somebody wants to just motion i'm sorry i can't see everyone's camera i like to i can

▶ 1:12:54 Christopher Cinella: motion for passage yes second motion for passage by vice chair Migliorelli seconded by councillor mcnaught madam clerk could you quickly call the roll

▶ 1:13:08 Speaker 1: councillor Migliorelli yes councillor Tramontozzi yes councillor mcmaster yes

▶ 1:13:21 Speaker 1: also mcnaught yes that's the eckles yes yes counselor stewart yes sir thomas yes

▶ 1:13:28 Speaker 1: that's the gemality yes president Grigoraitis yes chairman snella yes 11 yes to move the bottom line

▶ 1:13:36 Speaker 7: i'd like to move the recess thank you all thank you i'll let you out

▶ 1:13:41 Christopher Cinella: Motion to recess by Councilor McNaught, seconded by Councilor Garipay.

▶ 1:13:48 Speaker 1: Councilor Migliorelli. Yes. Councilor Tramontozzi. Yes. Councilor McMaster. Yes. Councilor McNaught. Yes. Councilor Eccles. Yes. Councilor Garipay. Yes. Councilor Stewart. Yes. Councilor Thomas. Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine. Yes. President Grigoraitis.

▶ 1:14:10 Speaker 1: Yes. Chairman Sinella. Yes. You're recessed. All right, recess. President Griggs, it's all you.