Public Comment

Transcript (~37 min @ 0:40)

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

▶ 0:38 Francis X. Wright Jr.: need that roll call first oh very good that we will have a roll call and all

▶ 0:45 Francis X. Wright Jr.: the men Bewtra here Alderman Medeiros here Alderman Forbes here Alderman Zwirko here Alderman Mortimer yeah Alderman Boisselle here Alderman Trematozzi Alderman Lipper-Garabedian here Alderman McMaster here and

▶ 1:09 Francis X. Wright Jr.: president Lemmerman here I heard a motion for public comment by Alderman Mortimer seconded second he's a non-voting member so second good point

▶ 1:18 Francis X. Wright Jr.: all by Alderman Forbes second the at this point in the meeting anyone

▶ 1:27 Francis X. Wright Jr.: interested in commenting on any matter that's on our agenda this evening may come forward sign in and speak on one of the three matters on tonight's agenda

▶ 1:48 Speaker 1: Dan Kretschmer from 110 East Emerson Street I'm also vice chair of the pet bike committee and a member of the traffic Commission as well back to speak on a subject we were here to speak on in February and that's the ordinance regarding shared mobility and bike share we submitted pretty detailed comments on the ordinance at that time so I won't go back into detail on those you have them and as the ordinance hasn't changed our comments haven't changed very much either what has changed is what we sort of predicted at the time was that the vendor had to align the number of bikes on the street with demand and that certainly happened the big change is that there's been about a two-thirds reduction in the number of bikes out on the street due to the fact that that's just what the demand is on an average day there have been about 25 bikes on the streets compared to 60 70 at the beginning the other day I went out and did a survey field survey was only able to find 16 off the app that were in the city I looked to see how they were parked and where they were parked and one of those 16 bikes was parked impeding a sidewalk it was on a side Street on a hill the rest were all parked properly clearly people are making efforts to do that the Planning Department reports that complaints have been minimal especially since they published even after they publicized the fix through see click fix and if you read the city agreement in the ordinance we did mention this before that are already on the books we feel they're more than adequate capability to enforce and address any problems so therefore we believe that the ordinance isn't necessary but we understand others might disagree and as a result the pedestrian bike committee reviewed the ordinance carefully back when it was originally submitted we had input from people with a lot of experience in the transportation field and one with direct experience in the bike share industry while much of the ordinance was fine we identified a number of concerns including what we felt were over regulation of technologies that you know may not be clearly defined yet unclear definitions and descriptions and some inconsistencies with state legislation that was out there defining various types of shared mobility vehicles so far none of those comments have been incorporated into the ordinance it seems to remain the same and we feel that it would be you know we've heard from people saying there are some issues with line bike we want to make it better and we feel that our input would make an ordinance better if if everybody felt that that was the way to go if the board believes in older an ordinance is necessary either now or in the future we think the right way to do it is to gather the input of key stakeholders that would include the city departments responsible for administration and enforcement and as well as other interested parties including the PBC the vendor senior citizens Chamber of Commerce and others it's not easy to regulate new technology properly and we think if it's going to be done at some point it should be done in that manner rather than just having uh an ordinance drop without that type of input thank you thank you

▶ 5:34 Speaker 2: i'm jonah kiorenza i'm uh at 515 lebanon street and i'm the chair of the ped bike committee i'm also a transportation planner i work at the u.s department of transportation volpe center in cambridge just a couple of comments to follow up on dan's comments You know, one of the issues, one of the reasons that the Ped Bike Committee exists, one of our primary goals is to provide more transportation options, to make it safer, more comfortable for people to walk or bike if they choose, and we think that line bike is one of those options. I definitely will acknowledge that they're having some growing pains, and we have some users who may not be parking the bikes properly. But again, echoing Dan's comments, I think that there are other ways to deal with that, that the number of instances of improperly parked bikes and the resolution to move the bike slightly out of the way when the rare occasion that one has found improperly parked arises suggests that there is not a problem worthy of an ordinance of this sort of level of severity. are some reasons that we may be seeing under utilization of the bikes one the number of bikes out there actually might be kind of low the city is capped the number of bikes through the agreement with the vendor at 75 which is down from 100 originally and of course we're well below that as we've documented in sort of bi-weekly posts thanks to information being sent to us from the planning department hovering around 2025 average bikes in the city and one of the things that may be impeding to use because we had a discussion on our listserv about this a lot of people in Melrose have their own bikes and if they choose to ride bikes they ride their own bikes but one of the things that's great about line bike is a first and last mile connection to transit and because of the location of a lot of Melrose just sort of outside of walking distance of Oak Grove which is a much more affordable transportation option to the city than the closer commuter rail stations a lot of people might end up using lime bikes to get to and from the station particularly earlier in the morning or later in the day when the MBTA bus service isn't as regular but one of the problems is that currently lime bike is not allowed to station bikes on MBTA property which is kind of ludicrous but that is actually being worked through the channels where lime is working with MBTA and we've communicated through Emma I'm sure through the planning department are feeling that that's something that definitely needs to be remedied at terminal stations like Oak Grove so that this can provide the service that folks might benefit from so we think that's sort of that's an area that this board could provide more support for as

▶ 8:47 Speaker 1: opposed to this ordinance thank you my name is Tom Middleton I live at two banks place and my daughter and I are both residents of Melrose and I am here to support and endorse the plastic straw law the use of items such as plastic straws that are only used once and then thrown away has been a big concern of mine for a long time I've been requesting those straws when I dine out for years only to have them given to me or to be put into my drink before I can make my request single-use items create a tremendous amount of trash on a daily basis plastic straws are not recyclable and often contaminate our recyclable materials this isn't this increases the overall trash and disposal cost for our city and is extremely detrimental to our environment plastic straws and stirs often make the top 10 lists of items that are found during ocean and coastline cleanups so for my daughter myself for the city of Melrose and the health of our planet i implore you to support this law thank you hi good evening steve leibman 11

▶ 10:02 Speaker 3: rigid lane um i have one brief additional comment on the proposed bike share ordinance i think before my comment it's probably appropriate for me to preface it by saying that until very recently i was on the executive management team of a bike sharing company with over 10 000 bicycles in more than 200 cities in North America. In that role, I served as an industry representative helping cities, large and small, develop policies that were appropriate for their cities with respect to shared mobility, including bikes and scooters. Those included Chicago, the Los Angeles Department of Transportation, and a whole bunch of smaller cities that are closer in character to Melrose. My comment is that while I do think it may eventually make sense to create ordinances that are specific to shared mobility and bike share in particular, I don't think that the proposed ordinance serves Melrose's needs very well. I think that the feedback mentioned by Dan and Jonah provided by the Pedestrian Bike Committee sums it up pretty well. i would recommend is not passing the ordinance as written and instead revisiting it at a later date perhaps including some of the language from the existing uh statement work in agreement with lime

▶ 11:40 Speaker 4: thanks hi um we're here with the melrose high school environmental club and we have started this year and we're trying to be active in things like these and all of these smaller issues may seem small but they're a part of the bigger problem that we have here in melrose and with

▶ 11:54 Speaker 5: that being said um we would like to support the passing of the plastic straw law as we feel that it will set a precedent in melrose to allow people to have the option of whether to use a plastic straw or not and by doing that that will limit the single use plus of the single plastic straw use

▶ 12:28 Speaker 6: thank you thank you thank you hi uh finn mcsweeney 160 west wyoming street my family and i just moved to Melrose in January we love it so far I'm here to speak against the bike sharing regulation as it's currently written I was thrilled to see that line bike was here when we moved here my son goes to the Y Academy he rides his bike there every single day we have a blast we are on the sidewalks every day with him. Certainly from time to time you'll see line bikes. I've never personally seen a line bike parked on the sidewalk here in Melrose, but you'll see things obstructing the sidewalk, you move them. I do bike pretty much every day. I use line bike from time to time though. If it's raining in the morning, and I know it's not going to rain in the afternoon, maybe I'll take the bus to Oak Grove and I don't have my bike with me, so I'll line bike back. My brother visited me earlier this summer. He didn't bring a bike with him, obviously, so he used LineBike when he was here. It's a great tool to have in our arsenal. As a parent of two children, I can't stress this enough. We really need to think comprehensively about our strategy for alternative forms of transportation in Melrose. I'm sure everyone saw the article in the Post last week, New England is already warming faster than any other part of the country. We have air pollution problems here. We have huge traffic problems here. Please, if we want to talk about legislating alternative forms of transportation, let's do it in a way that encourages smart use of them and encourages everyone to take advantage of them. They're great services. think this is just kind of slapdash and I would really be embarrassed I think to see in the paper a headline that said you know Melrose passes restriction on ride-sharing let's work together to pass something that works for everyone and that works with the other towns in the transportation network around us thanks

▶ 14:55 Speaker 7: the 34 south high street in melrose and i've been a resident of melrose for 40 years i've also volunteered to help clean up alpine by the way i'm speaking about the straw ordinance the straw and stir ordinance i've frequently over the last 40 years helped to clean up the el pond with the friends of the el pond and each year we collect bags full of litter and much of it is plastic and one of the things I find most is plastic straws. We need this ordinance now because plastic litter is flowing into our storm drains and into our oceans. In the past two years, we've seen whales being washed ashore as countries like Italy, Thailand, and the Philippines. They died because their stomachs were full of plastic, 40 to 80 pounds of plastic. They died of starvation. It's not just whales. UNESCO estimates that 100,000 marine animals die because of plastic pollution each year. In fact, a report from the MacArthur Foundation predicts that by 2050, plastics in the ocean will outweigh the fish. Now, this impacts me because I'm primarily a plant eater, plant-based diet, and I do get some protein from my fish. And now it's estimated that a quarter of all fish has plastic in its flesh. Now I have to hesitate about eating fish. If it's in our oceans, where else is it? A recent study by the Interior of the U.S. Geological Society Survey has discovered that microplastics are in 90% of our rainwater. I'm a gardener and I grow vegetables. If it's in the rainwater, is it getting into my vegetables? What's left? Several of the businesses here in Melrose have already transitioned away from plastic Turners and La Chara are two of them. The assistant manager of Starbucks today, I spoke to him, he told me that he thinks that they'll have no problem with complying with the straw ordinance here in Melrose. That the corporate Starbucks is already doing so in many other cities throughout the country and throughout the world. I wanted to show you a lid. Can you hand me my purse? They showed me a lid that they're using at Starbucks already, so that they don't have to use a straw. So that you get a cold drink, it's got a large opening, and they have a little piece of sticky paper that they can cover it if you want to carry it out. So it won't spill. So you don't need anything else to plug that up. You don't need a straw. So, I talked to the Bohemian coffee shop today as well, and they're already ordering lids like this. So, I urge you to pass this plastic straw water. It alone is not going to solve our problems about the ocean, but it's a step in the right direction. I'd like to be able to tell my grandchildren that we did what we could to try to save this beautiful planet, and by doing so here in Melrose, we start here on the small level. the way the recycling committee is has gifted you each with two metal straws they're in your mailboxes and you'll find them after the meeting so you will have an alternative thank you very much hi everybody I'm Gina McNeil with the

▶ 18:37 Speaker 7: Melrose recycling committee thanks so much for considering this ordinance it's as many of you know from the work that we did as a committee on the plastic bag ordinance starting around 2015 and culminating in the passage of the ordinance in 2017 the whole issue of single-use plastics is incredibly important we believe to just environmental initiatives and a huge priority for our committee so we were very pleased when alderman Wright proposed this stirs and straws ordinance I know you've heard from Trudy and others and probably see in the media every day lots of compelling reasons about why we need to address plastic pollution and reduce our production of single-use plastics generally so I'm gonna leave it to others and to the information you already have to speak to that I just wanted to make a couple of kind of quick points in the interest of time one of the important things they think about this ordinance is to think about it as an effort to reset the default behavior so if you think about it the default now is that everything comes with a straw regardless of whether you want often whether you want it or need it when in fact it would make a lot more sense for straws and for probably other things in our lives for the default behavior to be that you don't get it and then if you need it or want it then you can access it this just makes a lot more sense in terms of how we use our resources how those resources are disposed of and on and on and that's really what this very common sense ordinance seeks to do Trudy mentioned that a number of the businesses were lucky in Melrose that we have some businesses that are already voluntarily undertaking the reduction of straws or substitute with more environmentally friendly options in their operations but an ordinance is really important to make sure that those changes are permanent and lasting and not just voluntary actions that businesses do today but then if management changes or those businesses go away and new businesses replace them or what have you Melrose is seeing a lot of growth we're gonna see new businesses come in we want to make sure that everyone is complying with this this high standard and again helping us to protect our resources and then the last point I wanted to make is just speaking to the implementation process for this. I know anytime a new law comes under consideration, the practicality of how will we implement it, how will we enforce it, and what kind of resources is that gonna require is always an important consideration. I think that the work that we did on the plastic bag ordinance and the implementation of that provides a really good template. For those of you who aren't aware, the ordinance obviously went into place last year, And the key thing that we're very proud of as a recycling committee is that there have been no written warnings or fines issued in relation to that. And it's been a really, I think, light lift for City Hall in terms of the resources required to both implement and enforce it. And one of the reasons is that we did a really good job working with City Hall of laying the groundwork and the rollout, communicating multiple times in multiple ways to businesses and residents about the what this was what was coming what it meant etc so I think we envision that same process for something like the plastic stirrers and straws order so that we can again make sure that we kind of accomplish the goal but without creating a lot of burden or surprises either for City Hall or for the businesses and residents and all rows and again I think the plastic bag ordinance and the template we saw there is a really good testimony that we can be successful in doing the same on this ordinance thank you my name is Ryan

▶ 22:33 Ryan Williams: Williams and I live at 88 Malvern Street I want to talk a little bit about all three items on the agenda first the shared mobility shared mobility ordinance I want to echo the statements of my friends at the Melrose pedestrian and Cyclist Advisory Committee made in addition I would like to challenge the board and and your your contacts within Melrose city government to ensure that walking and biking is truly accessible in Melrose before you start finding ways to regulate new methods of non-motorized vehicle transportation for instance it would be a great start to have all of the sidewalks and intersections intersections shoveled in the winter it's a little difficult sometimes to scale the three or four foot high ice mounds that pile up at some of the locations like we shared a couple of months ago and photographs the senior center Linfels and Main Street and some of the other neighborhood intersections especially in in the back end of Lebanon and closer to the cemetery in places where I frequently walk it would be great to have the board legislate method to enable the city to do a neighborhood traffic calming program to appropriate funds and methodology to finding ways to address some of our speeding and cut-through traffic problems certainly getting people out of their cars is key to those issues and line bike provides just that resource secondly on the plastic straw ordinance heartily support it plastic straws and plastic cutlery or a big pet peeve of mine especially when they're provided without my having to without my request or without my asking for them as an avid hiker and person who really appreciates all the wonderful conservation land that we have especially in the area where I live it really saddens me to see little pieces of plastic and straws crushed up and ground down into the dirt wherever I go It seems like some places, Pine Banks Park or Knox Memorial Trail, if you're looking carefully, you can always find a plastic straw floating around somewhere, and that's because these objects are very small, they're very lightweight, and if you leave it up to people to voluntarily dispose of them properly, even the best intention, people can have them fall out of their pocket, or they can blow out of a trash can during collection, or they can fall through the cracks of a broken garbage bag. and they're so light and small that they just drift around and end up everywhere and finally on the vacant property ordinance I also wanted to show strong support for that because I believe that anything we can do to beautify and provide more art to downtown Melrose would be a net gain for the city the downtown area is extremely attractive as we all know and it has a lot of great character to it and I think that the addition of a little bit of public art especially in places like the Papagino's restaurant which has been closed for quite some time and just kind of sits vacant out on a very busy and highly visible corner can add a lot of beauty and dynamic character to our city thank

▶ 25:58 Speaker 3: you any other comments my name is Robert Bell and I'm here to discuss the vacancy ordinance or to just actually make a request in relation to the vacancy ordinance which is this i think that it's only fair that the parties at interest be notified as to what is going on with the potential regulation of commercial properties in town it would be unthinkable that we would make a zoning change that would affect commercial property owners without them all being notified in fact it's statutorily required that and when we have done any kind of urban planning

▶ 26:51 Speaker 3: initiatives melrose has always been very open in terms of process by being by starting with notifying those who are the interested parties as to what's going to be discussed very easy to get a list of commercial property owners from the assessor's office and i think that they should be involved in this process because i don't think that they have the slightest idea that they're about to have a mandatory regulation of their property done without their input so that's just a request i think you'd be doing yourselves a favor in terms of the possible uh snapback from the commercial ownership community melrose has always operated as a public private partnership and it this max of a bit of command and control that should be done on a much more collegial level i think the idea of having art in vacant properties while landlords property owners are dealing with re-tenanting or selling is fine but the idea that if you don't sign up for it you get penalized that i think requires the input of the affected property owners if this were to be a voluntary program i think you'd see widespread adoption i think you've got to work out the liability aspects what happens if the stuff is the art is damaged while it's on premises i don't think you can expect landlords to take over that liability and if the artists are willing to take the risk of their artwork being damaged then I think you'll find some acceptance but I think you'll find a lot

▶ 28:58 Speaker 3: of just outright scofflaw about it if you try to force it down their throats so I'm just advising you that I think it would be best to notify the property owners and hear what they have to say and work it out together like we always we still on every other urban planning issue thank you I live at 32 South High

▶ 29:37 Speaker 1: Street I've been a resident of Melrose for about 30 years and I don't have website I'm just here to endorse the straw ordinance everything I've heard I totally endorse it my office is in Cambridge I love how Cambridge operates I love how Melrose operates when it does things and for the for the community for environment this is sort of like one of those do the right thing make us proud

▶ 30:22 Speaker 4: ask the origins thanks I'm Kim Kerrigan from 100 cottage Street and I'm here to give my full support for the straw ordinance I've been a family nurse practitioner for about 30 years and I'm very concerned about the effects of plastic on all people but especially young children and I know straws seem like so little what's the big deal but when you think of the millions of straws there are it can make an impact and I've worked a lot with behavioral change with people and it's hard when you're working with people who may be trying to eat healthy or exercise or not smoke I'm sorry I get a little emotional but it's so it's so hard so we need to make it easy for people that if they don't want a straw if they don't have to get it and then they have to think do i want a straw and maybe it'll give them a little pause to think what would be best for their for their health and their health

▶ 31:40 Speaker 5: of their children thank you hi hi i'm lisa montori trimble i live at 11 rider avenue i'm pulling up the health care support for the plastic straw ban i'm also deeply concerned both about the

▶ 31:58 Speaker 5: environmental impacts of our very heavy plastic culture and but more recently I've always been concerned about that and the environmental impacts especially of single-use plastics somebody who cares about the environment and cares about other creatures but I've also as a nurse and citizen been very concerned about the micro plastic issue about how these products biodegrade into really tiny plastic pieces which are now in the Arctic they're at the bottom of the ocean they're in our food chain they're in us and it's a it's a really serious public health concern that will become more and more problematic over the years in the future and so plastic straws or I think they're about 0.3 percent of the of the plastic waste that we generate but but it's a starting point for having people really think about our plastic use and be able to make behavior change and as somebody who's been trying to avoid single-use plastics in restaurants it's really hard I don't know if you've tried to do this but you know I have to upfront say I don't want a straw and often I will forget and people give me a straw so or give me a plastic container I don't want so I think this helps give people choices and it helps create more options for people like myself who want to make a difference in a positive way and it also creates a demand for businesses to create alternatives to the single-use plastic culture that we have now so thank you for taking this up and i strongly support it and thank you for listening to my comments hi george stubbs um

▶ 34:02 Speaker 3: 111 warwick road i've been living in melrose for about 33 years now I am a member of the recycling committee but the remarks I'm making here tonight reflect my own personal views about the reasons to pass the proposed plastic straws or the ordinance as a former environmental reporter I stay current with environmental issues and it seems that over the past couple of years not a a week goes by that I don't see news of a report or study that just provides us with a better understanding of what the very large volume of plastics in our oceans is doing to marine life. And others before me tonight have testified about that, so I think I would just go on to point out something else. According to current estimates, about 10 percent of all plastic products are recycled. are several reasons for this this very low rate for one thing our technological capacity to reprocess these materials is very limited the the plastic industry seems to take stay several steps ahead and coming up with new uh polymers and and new things that are tough to recycle and we're not seeing the investment at the back end to take these these products back another factor is the fact is the simple fact that some people whether by accident or otherwise seem to allow their stuff to get out in the environment on a pretty routine basis as those of us who have participated in the spring cleanups have found i think one thing is certain um the wastes we do generate are overwhelming the existing waste management system and that includes traditional uh disposal like incineration and landfilling as well as recycling we are generating an awful lot of stuff and i think it makes abundant sense to generate less so in light of all of this some people may think the plastic straws ordinance that is being proposed here doesn't go far enough but we have to take advantage of opportunities as they present themselves and we have the opportunity to do the right thing here without essentially harming our standard of living in any serious way so I believe the time is right for this ordinance thank you

▶ 36:49 Speaker 7: Karen twice I live at 56 Conrad Road I've been in Melrose resident Melrose about 35 years I know you all understand the issue that we have with plastics this is a purse I am a member of the recycling committee but this is my personal plea to you as a mother and a grandmother I think that the getting rid of plastic straws and stirrers is one of the easiest things we can do in terms of eliminating some of our plastic use I think it's a no-brainer I urge you to please pass this ordinance thank you is there anyone else who would like to

▶ 37:43 Francis X. Wright Jr.: comment on any of the three items on tonight's legal and legislative matters

▶ 37:56 Francis X. Wright Jr.: agenda motion to close public comment second motion to close public comment by Alderman Forbes seconded by Alderman Zwirko all in favor of closing public comment aye public comment is closed we'll move on to the orders first of