ORDER-2017-12 : Petition to the Great and General Court to enact a Special Act to authorize the city of Melrose to amend the Melrose city charter to replace the term "Board of Aldermen" with "City Council" and replace the term "Alderman" with "Councilor"

Transcript (~12 min @ 33:35)

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▶ 33:27 Speaker 4: opposed that order passes order 2017-12 petition to the great and general court to enact a special act to authorize the city of Melrose to amend the Melrose City Charter to replace the term Board of Aldermen with City Council and replace the term Alderman with counselor this order comes from the committee on

▶ 33:51 Speaker 1: appropriations without recommendation motion to place on file second alderman inferno moves to place the order on file the motion is seconded by alderman forbes is there any discussion on

▶ 34:02 Speaker 1: the motion i have alderman medeiros alderman lemmerman and alderman inferno i'll defer to alderman lemmerman alderman lemmerman for the order you have the floor thank you mr president um

▶ 34:14 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: I would just like to say that there were aldermen that spoke during our committee hearing on this item that indicated that they would like to hear from additional members of the public, and there has been the opportunity to do that, and I feel that it would have been fair to allow for a final vote on this order this evening. I am very much opposed to placing it on file before taking that vote, and should the votes have shaken out that way i would have supported that um i i don't feel that this is the right order in which to to take these votes and just want to say that um for the record thank you

▶ 34:55 Monica C. Medeiros: thank you Medeiros thank you um during our committee meeting some emails were added to the record i would like to add some additional correspondence that we had received so that it's a little bit more full of uh the comments that we have received from the public we've received quite a lot so at this time i'd like to move to add an email from joy fey from thursday

▶ 35:26 Monica C. Medeiros: august 25th an email from maria winslow from sunday august 14 2016. email from ann norton

▶ 35:37 Monica C. Medeiros: from august 17 2016 an email from marcia sullivan from august 22nd 2016.

▶ 35:45 Monica C. Medeiros: and i believe the email from don lehman on august 15 2016 had already been added

▶ 35:53 Speaker 1: is there any objection to adding those emails to the record relative to this order

▶ 35:57 Speaker 3: a point of information what's your point of information the question i would like to ask

▶ 36:00 Peter D. Mortimer: is uh didn't we receive one more email today from a person named lata miss lata also signed on by uh katie kennedy and there was one other uh person who signed on would it be prudent to add those to the record as well i think they have been added they're added all right very good though although

▶ 36:21 Monica C. Medeiros: that's and i just point out that you know this is some of the sort of inconsistency which i had filed an order last year to try to you know make it would be those that email from lotta and katie kennedy had been a lot of williams katie kennedy had been already automatically added to the record whereas alderman lemmerman moved to uh add her letters as a motion and you know so therefore i'm adding now but it's a little bit inconsistent in how we're applying this anything for the

▶ 36:57 Peter D. Mortimer: relative alderman mortimer uh thank you for the point of information mr president and on

▶ 37:01 Speaker 1: discussion if it's discussion alderman inferno is next in line oh very good then i'll i'll wait

▶ 37:10 Gail Infurna: please proceed thank you mr president um i i made the motion to place this on file this has been before us quite a few times um we just voted to um establish a special committee to complete the review of the charter i believe this would be part of the review of the charter this way whatever comes out of that review would if there were any changes that were recommended then the public would have a opportunity to weigh in because it would go to the voters so i feel that would be the proper avenue for that so that's why i made my motion to place on file

▶ 37:48 Francis X. Wright Jr.: thank you alderman wright thank you mr president uh i appreciate alderman inferno's reasoning uh However, we have invested a considerable amount of time in this. It also predates the motion to review the charter. So we're all here tonight. It's on the agenda. I think we should take a vote.

▶ 38:07 Speaker 1: Alderman Suerko.

▶ 38:09 Michael P. Zwirko: Thank you, Mr. President. I wanted to echo the comments of Alderman Wright as well as Alderman Lemmerman. As you know, I'm in support of this order, and I do feel that we should have an up or down vote. I also wanted to state that the order that just unanimously passed, while I appreciate that from my colleagues, these one of these is not like the other we can walk and chew gum at the same time I see no reason why we can't approve the order for passage 2017-12 allow the great and general court to do what they need to do and the Charter Commission to do what they need those are two ways in which charters can be amended and updated I support 2017-12 and I wish we could have an up-and-down

▶ 38:52 Speaker 1: vote on verse pleasing on file thank you okay anything further on the motion alderman mortimer

▶ 38:55 Peter D. Mortimer: yes i agree with those sentiments and alderman lemmerman alderman wright and alderman Zwirko and generally our decorum although it's not absolutely required by robert's rules and our rules of order generally the person who's the maker of the order is given first opportunity to make a motion she would like to see a full vote and the only way that can happen procedurally is that the maker of the motion to place it on file would withdraw their order and the second would be withdrawn as well i would respectfully request that that happen at this time the maker of the order has put a lot as alderman wright said a lot of time effort and energy into this and if she would like to see if alderman lemmerman would like to see a full vote i think she's entitled that so i will throw that request out on the floor for consideration by the maker of the motion to place the order on file and the person who seconded the motion to place the order on file that's my request at this time okay well you are correct about the procedure

▶ 39:59 Speaker 1: there's a motion that's been made and duly seconded usually am thank you sir anything further

▶ 40:09 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: Alderman McAteer-Margolis. Yes, I would also be supportive of having this come to a vote.

▶ 40:17 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: One of the things I had asked for was that I'd like some more input from the public and in fact as Alderman Lemmerman has indicated I have received some more input from the public and I'm also appreciative of the committee the board passing the order for a charter review because I think that kind of puts this particular order in a different light, that we don't really have to consider it as part of that. We can consider it on its own merits, and I, too, would like an opportunity to vote on it.

▶ 40:53 Speaker 1: Thank you. Any further discussion? Alderman Forbes.

▶ 40:56 Scott M. Forbes: Thank you, Mr. President. I would definitely be willing to withdraw my second. You know, I do appreciate the effort that was put forth by Alderman Lemmerman regarding this order, and I do believe that we're all trying to make decisions here that point the community in the right direction and make, you know, where we live a better place. There's been a lot of dialogue, and all the discussion has been positive and respectful. I think that must continue regardless of the vote this evening. So it seems that my colleagues want an up-and-down vote. i i respect all of you here in the horseshoe and i will withdraw my second and we can have an up and down vote and and if that's the will of the board so thank you well in order to we would need

▶ 41:41 Gail Infurna: the maker to withdraw withdraw the motion as well uh tough position um i with all due respect to the maker of the order um and i know this has been going back and forth i firmly believe in my my order but I will concede and I mean if we placing on a file we're voting it up or down to so I don't see what the difference is but I will let the maker of the order do what she wants to do with the order okay there is no motion

▶ 42:06 Speaker 1: before you what's your pleasure motion for passage that Lemmerman moves passage of the order the motion is seconded by alderman

▶ 42:18 Speaker 1: Zwerch oh is there any discussion alderman Medeiros thank you I just

▶ 42:20 Monica C. Medeiros: wanted to uh follow up a little bit on our discussion from committee uh you know at that time i had discussed a little bit of with my personal opinion i had also gone out and sought as much opinion as i could get as it was the the middle of the summer when this was originally submitted but nonetheless i have been able to talk to quite a few people uh and including you know i moved to add some additional emails tonight one of those was in favor the remainder are actually in opposition and you know there is uh i would say certainly by and large of

▶ 43:01 Monica C. Medeiros: the people that i've spoken with they have not been really in support of this and to varying degrees some have been very upset about it and others think you know it's not as much a big deal But overridingly, people have said to me, what, that's the biggest issue you guys have to deal with? Isn't there something more that you have to do with your time? And, you know, I respect very much Alderman Lemmerman for bringing this forward. She has real sincere thoughts about this, I believe, and as do many of the people who have written to us as well. But I think that the better place to discuss this is in a charter review, to look at the whole charter. I think it would be better to go through that process that we've just voted to begin. And if it is, you know, decided that we should make changes, that we should have public hearings and a public involvement process that's a little bit longer. I mean, there's some talk about this being administrative. I think any change to the charter is not simply administrative. The charter is basically our constitution as a community, as a city, and it's important, and I think it's a proper and better process to go through something that opens it up to more people and for a longer amount of time to really reflect on it as part of the bigger process. so i'm not going to support this change today to change to city council but i hope that it is discussed in the in the charter review more fully thank you thank you anything else

▶ 44:47 Speaker 1: ms o'shea could you call the roll please Yes.

▶ 44:52 Speaker 2: No. Alderman Inferna?

▶ 44:53 Speaker 8: No.

▶ 44:55 Speaker 2: No. Alderman Lemmerman? Yes. Yes. Alderman McAteer-Margolis? Yes. Yes. Alderman Medeiros? No. No. Alderman Mortimer? Yes. Yes. Alderman Tramontozzi? No. No. Alderman Wright? Yes. Yes. Alderman Zwirko? Yes. Yes. President Conn? No.