An order to define the Veteran Volunteer Tax Work Off Program established by the Melrose Board of Alderman in 2012, including a description of the program, eligibility requirements and necessary application documents.

Transcript (~16 min @ 1:28:35)

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▶ 1:28:28 Devin Romanul: Motion passes. Ah, the ayes have it, and that will move on to the next city council meeting. Last but not least, we have today, uno sumi. That is the penultimate order. My apologies. 2026-616, an order to define the Veteran Volunteer Tax Work Off Program. Joining us this evening- Hello ... Ms. Tammy Shevelson, our veteran services director. Thank you so much for joining us.

▶ 1:28:51 Speaker 1: Good evening. How are you? Great. How are you? I'm good. Wonderful. So I'm here tonight asking that we codify the Veterans Property Tax Work Off Program that was started back in 2012. This program has been continuously in use since 2012. It's just that it never properly made it into the codification of the city charter, and we want to do that in order to define the program and be able to administer it moving forward favorably, and to ensure continuity with the program for many years to come. This is a really important program for veterans and their dependents as it allows them to do tax work off jobs for up to $1,500 right now towards their property taxes.

▶ 1:29:43 Devin Romanul: Wonderful. Thank you so much. I did have a question about the interplay of what's on the table tonight versus other benefits the city offers veterans in property taxes specifically, and the interplay between the two, and also my other question was about the yearly application year over year. Was that a requirement by the state or something that you all would like? Because I'm always on the eye out for benefits that local governments offer, but administrative paperwork potentially getting in the way of folks taking advantage of that benefit. So I was wondering if you might be able to speak to those two items.

▶ 1:30:20 Speaker 1: So just so I make sure I'm clear, are you talking about how this is different from the

▶ 1:30:30 Speaker 1: 65 plus tax work off program?

▶ 1:30:32 Devin Romanul: Or any other services we offer or any other benefits we offer to the veterans.

▶ 1:30:35 Speaker 1: Oh, okay. So this is different in terms of benefits for veterans. So like we have the Chapter 115 program, which is administered by the state. It's part of Massachusetts general law. But that is very specifically for low income individuals, and it's considered a bridge program. It's supposed to be an intermittent program to help them while we are helping them to look for federal or state benefits that would be more beneficial to them than what they can get from the city. So that is one program. And then the tax work off program is completely separate. And what sort of separates the Veterans Tax Work Off Program from, say, the Council on Aging Tax Work Off Program is you have to be 65 years or older to do that tax work off program, where the Veterans Tax Work Off Program, it doesn't matter what age you are, as long as you're a veteran or a dependent. As stated by the state of Massachusetts, you qualify as a veteran's dependent. Anyone who qualifies in those categories can do this tax work off program where they could not for the Council on Aging program.Yes, sir.

▶ 1:31:39 Devin Romanul: I'm sorry. I'm talking to you. Sorry. Councilor, and sorry, my other question Yeah, sorry. ... was about the application, the annual requirements. Is that something that the state mandates in its authorizing legislation, or is that something that you feel is a good best practice?

▶ 1:31:51 Speaker 1: The application in terms of individuals applying to be a part of this program?

▶ 1:31:55 Devin Romanul: Yeah, to be a part of it every single year.

▶ 1:31:56 Speaker 1: So this, it's an annual process that we do, and that just helps us because not everybody wants to come back every year. And so this just helps us to make sure that we're making sure we get out to everyone. And if we didn't have an annual application, maybe we only have 15 positions available. Well, it wouldn't be fair to just let the same 15 people do it year after year after year, because as the program is out there in the community and more people know about it, more people are going to want to apply for it. So we want to have those applications every year in order to really offer that to the most amount of veterans as we can, and their family members.

▶ 1:32:28 Devin Romanul: Great. Thank you so much. Councilor Williams. Thank you.

▶ 1:32:31 Ryan Williams: So it's a great program, can't wait to vote yes for it, but I had a couple of questions that I wanted to get some clarity on. So the reason we're here is that the Board of Aldermen goofed and voted place on file instead of voting yes. That is correct. Right. So they didn't vote no. Right. They voted to adopt it, and then they had to vote to do something else with it, and they did the-

▶ 1:32:57 Speaker 1: They placed it on file ... they placed it on file. The motion was incorrect.

▶ 1:32:59 Ryan Williams: Yeah. But we've been doing this?

▶ 1:33:01 Speaker 1: Technically, yes. Technically, yes. Trying to clean it up.

▶ 1:33:04 Ryan Williams: Right. So now we're cleaning it up. Fantastic. Okay, so I want to move on to the operation piece a little bit. How do you allocate hours to the work program participants, with regard to the different types of work that's being requested of them and the amount of abatement that they're offered? Is it like if people do harder work, do they have fewer hours? I mean, how does that sort of work out?

▶ 1:33:30 Speaker 1: An hour is an hour. So it doesn't matter what you do. Okay. You get the same hour as anybody else, whatever the job is. Right now, all of the positions are going to be within the veterans office. And so those things would be people supporting the veterans food pantry, so working at the food pantry once a month. Helping with Memorial Day activities and Veterans Day activities, assisting with food drives and outreach events, and different things like that. Maybe helping administratively in the office. We're also hoping to start a Thanksgiving and holiday support this year for our veterans, so it'd be working at any of those events and things like that.

▶ 1:34:08 Ryan Williams: Fantastic. And about how many hours do people work for one turn in the program?

▶ 1:34:14 Speaker 1: So it depends. So the nice thing that's different about our program versus the Council on Aging's program is that for our program, you don't have to just work for veteran services, right? So if something happened, and over the summer, maybe there were some positions that came open as greeter in City Hall, and we didn't have anyone from the Council on Aging to do that, they could come over and say, "Hey, Tammy, we've got X number of hours. Do you have any veterans that are already working and have been approved?" And my veterans could then do that. They don't have to just stick to one department or one job, they can move around. But in terms of hours, the Veterans Food Mart is five hours a month, every month. That's how many hours most people come and work because that's how long it takes us to do all of the setup. And so it's different in terms of Memorial Day activities. We have the flagging, which is an all-day event, so that's several, you're like five to eight hours there, depending. We have the food drives that we do that are part of that, so people can volunteer for that, and that's an all-day event as well. And then they're setting up for the Memorial Day program that we have. So we have multiple opportunities for people to participate and to gain hours in order to lessen their tax burden.

▶ 1:35:38 Ryan Williams: So my question is more around how much an individual participant would work to gain their $1,500 tax credit. Would they work 10 hours, 20 hours, 40 hours?

▶ 1:35:48 Speaker 1: It's tied to minimum wage. It's tied to minimum wage. Okay. So it'd be 150 hours. To the Council on Aging.

▶ 1:35:52 Ryan Williams: Okay. So as they work, you record, they do the time sheets. Tied to state minimum wage or federal minimum wage?

▶ 1:35:57 Speaker 1: State. Okay, that's good. That's good. So I think it'd be about 100 hours.

▶ 1:36:01 Ryan Williams: Yeah, that's a good thing. Okay, fantastic. All right. I have two more questions. You said that a spouse of a veteran could apply. Are the abatements gated to... Are they limited by parcel, or are they limited by person?

▶ 1:36:15 Speaker 1: They're limited by parcel.

▶ 1:36:16 Ryan Williams: Right. Okay. They're limited by parcel. Fantastic. And my third question I can't remember, so I'm just gonna not say anything.

▶ 1:36:23 Devin Romanul: All right. Thanks. Thank you, Councilor Williams. Up next, I have Councilor Park.

▶ 1:36:28 Speaker 3: Thank you, Committee Chair. And for our veterans back there sitting, thank you for your patience and thank you for your service. So my question to you is, have you done any analysis thus far on how many people, should this move forward, and I'm a proponent of this being reinstated, how many people would actually sign up, or how many people it would affect at this point?

▶ 1:36:53 Speaker 1: So I'm gonna be honest, I just took this position over in July, so I don't have any of the previous data of how many people have been in and out of this program since 2012. I know right now I have a list of about five to six different veterans and their family members who are waiting for this program to be approved so that they can apply.

▶ 1:37:11 Speaker 3: Okay. And well, you may have just answered this, but do we have any idea of through the demographics in terms of where they come, what their situation in life is, their ethnicity, potentially their age group?

▶ 1:37:26 Speaker 1: So I don't really have any of that information. I could say age-wise, we're looking at veterans or veteran family members that are somewhere between their 40s and 70s. Okay.

▶ 1:37:37 Speaker 3: One of the things, and I think Councilor Ryan had touched on, is that I'm really keen on this program and excited about it because traditionally the work that has been done for tax write-off programs has been as outlined in this clerical work, some tasks that pretty much anybody over a certain age limit can do. Potentially with guidelines of 30 pounds, certain other people might be qualifying for. But with the veterans that may potentially come into this program, I think there's a wide variety of different tasks or different ways we can come up with in terms of giving back to the community. And I would love to see that notion explored in terms of other ways other than the sort of conventional work-off programs that we have to benefit for both the community and also get their feedback. These veterans, what would they like to do that they think would be beneficial that they learned over the course of their time serving the military? But thank you.

▶ 1:38:41 Speaker 5: Councilor Kamjodi.

▶ 1:38:43 Manjula Karamcheti: Thank you so much. Thank you for being here. Just really appreciate that you've brought this back to the table to clean it up and make sure that it's available to folks. So I think really the only question I have is how might City Council, how might the city of Melrose, I think, be more helpful and supportive in terms of making sure people are accessing? And I think to Counselor Park's question, making sure that really great opportunities are available so people are enjoying what they're doing and finding value in it as well.

▶ 1:39:18 Speaker 1: So I don't know so much about the City Council, but I will say City Hall itself has been very helpful with me since I've started in helping me to outreach to the community through the newspapers and the kiosks and different avenues like that. So I think a lot of it in terms from the City Council perspective would be just word of mouth, letting your constituents know that this program is available to veterans. We're starting this month, we're having a monthly veteran and family social. We're going to have those every month, and those are going to be used to help extend information about what's available for veterans from the city, what we can do for them, how we can help them, different ways that we can help them, whether it's with tax abatements, whether it's with the tax work-off program, whether it's helping file for benefits. So any time you speak to a constituent that you know is a veteran, or maybe they're not a veteran, but they are a family member of a veteran, letting them know that where we are at City Hall and that we're available to help them is the biggest thing we can ask from you is just that word of mouth and talking to your constituents and letting them know that we're here to support them and their family members.

▶ 1:40:24 Speaker 6: That's actually really helpful. Thank you.

▶ 1:40:26 Speaker 5: Thank you. Councilor Finocchiaro.

▶ 1:40:28 Cal Finocchiaro: Yes. Actually, Councilor Kamjodi, she asked the same question I was going to ask, just about outreach, and so that's about it. But also thank you for taking over this position, and it sounds like you're doing really great stuff. So thank you.

▶ 1:40:43 Devin Romanul: I have Councilor Williams a second time.

▶ 1:40:45 Ryan Williams: I remembered my question. And I'm sorry, I didn't see the last document, which had a bunch of the answers I asked before, so I'm sorry about that. Thank you. First thing I wanted to point out or ask was this, in that section A, we were talking about outreach and if somebody knows there's a family member of a veteran, but the actual program participant has to be either a veteran or spouse or a veteran, and they have to be the homeowner.

▶ 1:41:08 Speaker 1: Right. So it has to be a veteran-- They have to be the homeowner. Yes. Has to be the spouse of the veteran or a qualified dependent as stated by Massachusetts state law. I see. Okay, great. And what that means is say you were a child of a veteran- Ma'am ... and before you turned 19, you were a disabled child of a veteran. Right. That disability status as a child renders you a dependent for the rest of your life, and therefore, you would be considered a dependent eligible for the tax work-off program. Yeah. Got it. But if your child does not have that designation, then you could not participate in this program- Got it ... because you are not considered a dependent anymore because you're over the age of 18.

▶ 1:41:53 Ryan Williams: So thank you. The question that I had was, can people work two work-off programs? Can a senior citizen who's also a veteran? No. So you do one or the other.

▶ 1:42:03 Speaker 1: No. They have to choose one or the other. Got it. And right now, to be fair, the senior work-off program is $2,000. Ours is $1,500. So I would say as senior citizens, if they were eligible for that program, I would definitely push them to that because it would get them more money. But at the same time, that program is inundated with applications, and they only have so many positions. So if they don't get a position there- Got it ... then I would say, "Then come back to me," and so we could at least get them something. But I certainly would want to push them towards where they could get the most bang for their buck.

▶ 1:42:34 Speaker 2: Awesome. Thank you.

▶ 1:42:35 Devin Romanul: I have Councilor Finocchiaro a second time.

▶ 1:42:38 Cal Finocchiaro: All right. I will make this quick. I thought of a question that I wanted to ask. With the senior tax work off, if they're unable to complete and work, they can assign somebody? So if there's a disabled veteran, can they assign somebody else to do the work for them? No, not in the veterans tax work-off program. We don't have that. Okay. Thank you.

▶ 1:42:59 Speaker 5: Councilor Chen.

▶ 1:43:01 Jason Chen: Thanks. In the past few weeks, I've had three veterans or their spouses come to me and talk about Ms. Shovelton and how authentic she is when she engages them. And I've seen her interact with veterans of all ages at luncheons and events, and we are extremely lucky to have her. Mm-hmm. So part of what I like about this program is a veteran that's coming to do a work-off program is probably struggling financially, maybe a little bit disconnected, struggling to integrate a little bit back, and there's nobody that I'd rather them talk to than Ms. Shovelton- Mm-hmm ... and have them come into a program like this. So I motion to recommend for approval. Second. Motion to recommend by Councilor Chen, second by Councilor Park. On discussion?

▶ 1:43:46 Devin Romanul: I do have one more inquiry. I'm curious, you alluded to the parity. Is it the state law that's preventing us from achieving that $2,000 parity with the senior workout program?

▶ 1:43:55 Speaker 1: So right now the state is working on pushing through for a $2,000 cap on our program as well. That probably will go through some time... The next year or two- In the next year or two ... not this cycle. Not this cycle. So once it does, I'll come back to you and ask you to raise the cap to 2,000. But we just have to wait for the state to approve it first.

▶ 1:44:16 Devin Romanul: Great. That was my assumption, but I appreciate the clarification. Thank you. Well, we'll keep a lookout for that. In the meantime, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 1:44:23 Speaker 2: Yes. Councilor Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kowal? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. Chair Romanul? Yes. Motion passes.

▶ 1:44:39 Devin Romanul: Motion passes. We will consider that in our next full council meeting. And last but not least, we have ID number 2026-6-18, acceptance of donations totaling $500,000 from the Friends of the Melrose Public Library and Trustees of the Melrose Public Library. Joining us this evening are CFO Goltz and Melrose Public Library Director Gardner. Good evening. Thank you for your patience.