Public Participation

Transcript (~5 min @ 0:33)

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

▶ 0:09 Peter D. Mortimer: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. It's 7.30 p.m. on May 25th, 2017. This is the Appropriations Committee of the Melrose Board of Aldermen. It is a committee of the whole. All members of the Board of Aldermen are members of this committee. I am the Chairman Peter Mortimer, we are joined by the Vice Chairman Gail Inferna, Alderman Michael Zwirko, Alderman John Tramontozzi, Alderman Mary Beth Macatia-Margolis, and Alderman Jennifer Lemmerman. This meeting is being recorded by MMTV and is available for future viewing on their website as well as the City of Melrose website. all the look excuse me alderman's work oh has made a motion to open the floor public participation duly seconded by alderman inferno all in favor please say aye any opposed hearing none participation is now open seeing no one wishing to come forward oh I'm sorry miss McAllister I didn't see you come in we have a member of the school committee Jamie McAllister coming forward to participate publicly please proceed so I'm Jamie McAllister grand I

▶ 1:11 Speaker 1: live at 22 Tappan Street and I also serve on the school committee so I'm here tonight in support of the budget that we were able to form on the school committee with a lot of work from finance chair Liz to Selm and the superintendent and our director of finance but I'm also here because this is my second year going through the budget cycle and the conversations that we're having as we go through this process are that we don't have the funds that we want to have to do what we want to do in the schools our federal support has gone down just like it has for the city our local state support has gone down and we've tried certainly some creative problem-solving to save funds and I think in some cases that's really helpful because we discover you know actually this was a better idea than we had in the first place and it works great but in other cases like with the loss of some of our administrative directors and I'm only speaking for myself here I'm not speaking on behalf of the committee I think that's a case where we could use more support and more administrative directors so that they can help with teacher development and teacher evaluations and so that's a case where we had to make cuts and it's not I don't think for the benefit of our students so our chair was able to get a

▶ 2:43 Speaker 1: joint meeting with our neighbor school committee in Wakefield and our representatives to talk about shared concerns that we have about funding support you know how circuit breaker funding and metco funding and numerous other things have not been fully funded in a number of years and it makes it really challenging for us to come up with a budget that's gonna do not just what we have to do but what we really want to do what the superintendent is training and developing her staff to do and to continue the work so so I'm really just here because I have the feeling you all see a lot more financial paperwork than we do on the school committee and I'm wondering what ideas you might have for how to make it so that next year we might be having a different conversation not a conversation about oh this is what the superintendent would like us to do and we can't do this and we can't do that and we can't do that and we're gonna have to cut some additional things but are there ways that we can think creatively or outside the box and that's not my really my area of expertise but I feel like has colleagues and people who are just as you know supportive of the city and its growth as the members of the committee are we could use your your help and your creative ideas on this one

▶ 4:12 Peter D. Mortimer: so thank you thank you very much committee person McAllister seeing no No further. Members of the public wishing to come forward and participate publicly, Alderman Zwirko has made a motion to close public participation, once again, duly seconded by Alderman Inferna. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Hearing none, public participation is now closed. On a point of personal privilege, I recognize Alderman Zwirko.

▶ 4:35 Michael P. Zwirko: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I was informed earlier today that one of our colleagues recently had lost the — her father had passed a Monica Medeiros father Roland Medeiros had passed and in honor of our colleague and the unfortunate circumstances that her and her family are dealing with this this time I wanted to ask if it was possible to have a moment of silence in his memory certainly best wishes to Alderman

▶ 5:17 Peter D. Mortimer: Medeiros and her family thank you this time of trouble continuing on with the

▶ 5:23 Peter D. Mortimer: The budget order held in committee, order 2017-140. The city of Melrose operating budget for fiscal year 2018 in the amount of $77,397,009.19. We will continue on now with the departmental hearings on each of their budgets. The first budget we will address is the school budget number 300 in the amount of $26,497,499.88.