Public Participation

Transcript (~22 min @ 0:49)

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

▶ 0:48 Speaker 1: indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

▶ 0:54 Speaker 1: As with all of our meetings, this meeting is being recorded by MMTV and will be rebroadcast at later periods in accordance with the Massachusetts Open Meeting Law. Motion to open the floor for public participation, Mr. President. Alderman Mortimer moves that we commence public participation. The motion is seconded by Alderman Inferna. On the motion, all those in favor? Aye. Anyone opposed? Motion passes. This is the portion of our meeting where any member of the public can come forward and speak relative to any order that is on our agenda.

▶ 1:34 Speaker 3: would like to start it off this evening as you all know by now I'm Phil Tamor

▶ 1:37 Speaker 2: sorry I had to miss the last two meetings I've since watched the meeting replays I guess I shouldn't be any longer but I'm still amazed that the city in this board virtually has made no progress resolving the significant water and sewer rate matters raised by the public all year long first the city's These final proposed 2017 combined water and sewer rates simply perpetuate unsupported billing rate differentials between low and high consumption tiers. Combining last year's two top tiers into one accomplishes nothing other than holding the prior tier three bill increases down slightly from what they otherwise would have been and making prior tier two bill increases slightly greater. The 2017 high tier rate is now an insupportable blended 78% higher than the low tier. I repeat, 78% higher, excluding constant MWRA charges. You intentionally have not reduced the combined high tier rate because you need to but won't increase the low tier rate at the same time. You pander to by subsidizing broadly and greatly the voting majority who are low tier consumers. by egregiously taxing high-tier consumers. Neither you nor your rate consultants whom you actually asked have been able to support the billing rate differentials across tiers. The differentials have been picked from thin air. You have neither the political courage nor the sense of what's required to correct the huge, arbitrary, insupportable subsidy you gave low-tier consumers at the expense of high-tier consumers implementing the tiered rate structure first in 2014 second you continue to let slide the city's recently disclosed decision to start billing ratepayers for its internal consumption when it clearly didn't need to change its billing practice you endorse this revenue grab which has raised water and sewer rates by 2% annually the billing practice change should be reversed contrary to what some aldermen continued to say the impact of the reversal can and should be accommodated with the city's broad 75 million dollar property tax budget and free cash which benefited from the change when it was implemented in the first place and does not require threatened cuts and teacher positions

▶ 4:08 Speaker 2: and the like third the city finally began to discuss some of the significant spending put in place over the past few years at the June 9th meeting focusing on indirect cost allocations from the property tax budget in the three years ending 2016 starting with the 2014 adoption of the new tiered rate structure indirect costs have increased by four hundred fifty nine thousand dollars annually or an average thirteen percent per year the city attributes much of this to the complexity of the new rate structure and related initiatives the implied complexity is really difficult to believe and eye-opening and prompt several questions where the benefits in our rates from these grand costly efforts because rates as this committee has noted have been increasing at a very high average seven percent per year during this period more so due to increased city controlled spending than any other factor when will this complexity and the associated costs actually decrease conversely if the complexity and cost will remain and no tangible benefits will be generated perhaps you might change to a simpler and less expensive approach that would deliver benefits to the ratepayers these indirect cost increases which are only one piece of the city controlled spending increases the past three years along with the billing to practice change impact alone have increased combined water and sewer rates by about five percent equal to the size of the proposed 2017 rate increase the city and board continue to fail on all matters above and intentionally avoid their direct and clear resolution the city and board has not done its job anyone else

▶ 6:21 Speaker 4: would like to speak this evening well I appreciate being able to speak tonight Lisa Halloran 27 Whittier Street I have looked into getting a water meter and in doing so some information and questions came up and I believe a week or so ago I also spoke about this the water meters are being charged so if I have a second water meter for my outdoor use that is being charged a 35 per quarter so a hundred and forty dollars a year charge I did ask the city why there was a charge and I was told it's because they will come and read my meter but my present meter is not somebody doesn't come and read my meter this is supposed to be a highly efficient meter that has a specialty required antenna that allows somebody to come by with a radio frequency and just read the meter so they drive or walk by to read it or it gets sent to the water department as our regular meters are now so I don't understand why there's a separate charge I was also told that the other reason is there's if there's a problem with the meter that the city would try to come and fix it but however stated in the city of Melrose water procedure meter installation it specifically says the property owner is fully responsible for all costs associated with owning and operating the second water meter so why am i paying a hundred and forty dollars a year for something that's already being done so it costs three hundred and sixty four dollars for the unit the meter sixty five dollars for the permit five hundred dollars for an average plumber to put this in and a hundred and forty dollars per year so that's over a thousand dollars that it's costing me within the first year to have this where is this supposed savings where's the incentive to have people use these meters so that we're reducing our water usage and sewer usage it's not making sense to me thank you thank you am I

▶ 9:07 Speaker 2: supposed to sign this please please hi my name is Jerry Moroz um our water

▶ 9:11 Speaker 2: Water system and sewer system need a lot of work, and there are a lot of distractions

▶ 9:18 Speaker 2: towards getting that work done. I don't see that through the budget process this year that we've made any inroads into

▶ 9:30 Speaker 2: getting more ahead of the curve than we've been on either leakage from our water system or the inflow and infiltration issues of our sewer system.

▶ 9:42 Speaker 2: But yet we've spent hundreds of hours, literally man hours, in this chamber, people talking about water and sewer issues, about things that are red herrings. They aren't the important issues. The issues we've been discussing for hundreds and hundreds of hours here are simple issues. They're straightforward issues. They're basic things. But yet, some people want to complicate them and juggle balls in the air or put curtains in front of things or whatever. We're not seeing the real things. I've said here consistently for the last three years, what I believe are the facts about

▶ 10:24 Speaker 2: water and sewer issues that I've deeply researched, that I go to the sources, I double-check and document them and i find correlations and i do analyses and i present them to you here what do you do with the work that i do you don't care one bit about it as a board every year for the last three years you've just denied every single thing i brought here without any factual basis i want to point out the rate that the appropriations committee recommended

▶ 11:07 Speaker 2: to you the same people tonight is purely arbitrary arbitrary is really the word there is no basis for that rate in the city of Melrose for that for that rate structure to be here tiers are irrelevant to Melrose they've been a distraction yes you've gotten more money from

▶ 11:21 Speaker 2: some people and kept the water and sewer system going by by charging some people exorbitant amounts of money but that shouldn't be the goal here the goal ought to be able to have a finely operating water and sewer system doing the best that it can do with the least money that it needs and charging people appropriately for their fair use I don't see any of

▶ 11:52 Speaker 2: those things occurring here you all feel like you've done some kind of calculations and have some rational basis for what you voted for the other night I don't see it it's never come here I've given you spreadsheets I've given you graphs I've given you pages and pages of my my analysis of where I come with the things that I come to you with there's been no rebuttal of it whatsoever occasionally your consultant or your your city solicitor will make a blanket statement that all the you know mr. morose is wrong or they won't use my name they'll just say oh a member of the public is wrong they don't tell you what is really wrong about it nobody ever gives me an opportunity to explain how maybe they are mistaken it's frustrating to be a member of the public trying to participate in the public process and be shut out every time for any kind of thing that you do you know I couldn't make it here for the budget hearing you had a couple weeks ago because I had a commitment and the presentation the board makes off when they ask for a public hearing and nobody comes it's kind of like oh well you know you really tried to have the public to come involved I don't feel welcome to come here and speak you give me my time and I appreciate that I don't feel welcomed I feel disrespected but what I really want

▶ 13:04 Speaker 2: to talk about here is that you have a whole lot of people coming from if you will, the executive branch of the city government, coming here with a mission, a mission to do what they want to do, whether it's factual, whether it's legal, whether it's honest or not. We've heard how many times over three years, somebody from even members of the Board of Maldon saying that we have to obey the state law. I've shown you what the state law says. I've shown you what the state law means. The state law actually uses the word that if you're having an increasing tiered rate, that it has to fairly reflect the resource demand and consumption of high-volume users. Fairly is not an optional word. Fairly is the state law. If you're going to fairly reflect the resource demand and consumption of high-volume users, and you're going to propose to have a rate that charges some people more than others, It is incumbent upon you to have the data in the backbone to present it here and show people why that's the case The fact that nobody has done that Nobody on the Alderman certainly, but certainly the consultants didn't DPW didn't city auditor didn't city treasurer didn't it tells me it tells me that they don't have it. I

▶ 14:29 Speaker 2: Mean, I know myself I can see it myself. I know what the facts are. I can read the thing I can analyze and go through it. I had a conversation with a city solicitor about this, and I showed him exactly how that law could be interpreted and should be interpreted. When he came here in front of you, he gave the biggest out in the world. Oh, based on the information given me by the DPW and the consultant, this is what I feel the law is. Hello, we're paying city solicitor as i now find out sixty thousand dollars a year out of the water and sewer fund

▶ 15:06 Speaker 2: to tell us something that's not even legal if you're going to be so righteous and claim month after month year after year that you're going to follow the state law i challenge you to do it tonight follow the state law put a rate structure in place that fairly reflects the resource demand and consumption of high volume users in melrose And the only one that fairly reflects the resource demand is a flat rate in Melrose with fixed base meter charges.

▶ 15:35 Speaker 2: Any of you that claim somehow that you've done some fancy calculations and have come to some other conclusion, you put your calculations on the table. I have. Don't sit here and act like you know something that you don't know. don't sit here and act as if oh you've considered all the facts and you've weighed things so so importantly and and you're the biggest you know supreme court in the world here you know arbitrating over over a dispute these are simple facts and figures people

▶ 16:07 Speaker 2: this is in part what is wrong with this city is that people are afraid to be honest believe me i understand the backstory here i understand that the city is spending too much money more than it can afford to spend under prop two and a half and they want to put every possible cost onto the rate payers of the water and sewer fund onto the trash enterprise fund that we we hit residents and taxpayers over and over and over again with fees upon fees upon fees we aren't honest that we're overspending what we can legitimately spend and everybody here is cowering behind process, behind asking people who have a vested interest in skewing the process to their own result. Can Melrose start being fair and honest with its citizens? Tell us you've spent too much. We heard the lies last fall. Oh, the city's in great financial shape. The override's just to make things a little bit better and more financially secure. Clearly we were teetering

▶ 17:17 Speaker 2: based on this budget process the defective budget document is given to you that they don't even project an accurate fy16 figure before they ask you to put an fy17 figure relying on what they budgeted for fy16 that's absurd budgeting i would never allow somebody who works for me to present me a budget that i can't have the information to accurately project what was needed this year and what could be needed for next year and if there's ever a discrepancy it ought to be spelled out what that discrepancy is that's not done here now i don't know if this board of alderman just doesn't want to ask for real information if you don't want the real information that's why you don't ask or whether you're fearful of asking because of the the self-righteous responses you get from administration every time you challenge them on something

▶ 18:07 Speaker 2: lily tomlin has a line that i want to repeat here she says

▶ 18:17 Speaker 2: no matter how cynical I get, I just can't keep up.

▶ 18:24 Speaker 2: It's so apropos here. The other night, I do give the benefit of the doubt to administration time after time after time. I always say they must know something, let me give them the benefit of the doubt before I go and challenge it. And then I look it up and do my research and then I challenge. I assumed when they talked about that they were getting rid of retroactive billing and in the conversation that I heard it was immediately subsequent to a conversation about the meters weren't all going to be in by June 30th, but we'll have them in by September 30th, and then we're going to bill everybody the old rate through September 30th. I foolishly put two and two together that I shouldn't. I assumed that they meant that they were going to take the September 30th readings of every person, bill them all at the old rate, and from October 1st go forward. When Alderman Medeiros brought to light here the other night that in fact they were still going to have retroactive billing with some people who are going to pay for their august and september rates at fy16 rates while other people were going to be unfairly charged fy17 rates for that that that's just it just it just blew my mind that they were doing another game and all this stuff they wanted to slide things through and you have let them do this year after year week after week time after time please stand up I know you have to put out a budget tonight that if you want your own budget you have to put out tonight if you want the mayor's budget you can just let it slide not vote and his budget's automatically there but discuss these budgets I don't know why they're not here tonight they feel that this is just pro forma that you're just going to rubber stamp everything and not do anything tonight but I'll tell you the last thing I want to say is that arbitrary is the word as this whole process has been I was willing to spend the thirty thousand dollars that the city was spending if we had a good consultant to come here and show us a real cost of service analysis we never got that that was fraudulent that we put out we had rfps we're going to have all this work done and all we got was somebody giving us a biased opinion basically paid to tell us what somebody wanted them to tell us again being cynical again the idea that we have

▶ 20:33 Speaker 2: a info infiltration i'll finish up right after this the idea that we have an infiltration and inflow mitigation fund that's been on the books for 10 years i saw on the on the website there were discrepancies something showed 150 000 something showed 80 000 something different things but why would we ever collect a mitigation fee and then not use it to mitigate anything we would be in better shape today in melrose with our sewer rates if we had used that money in 2005 when we got it to have it sitting in the back room in the books of melrose and who knows what that money's been played with year after year after year to have that sit there doing nothing is a waste just like the reserves these excess reserves are a waste to put money in if you're going to charge a water sewer rate payers all this money after this year it's a million dollars in retained earnings you budgeted for fy17 that's going to be another half million dollars in that's going to be retained earnings next year that'll bring it to a million and a half dollars of reserves basically money you pull out of the pockets of the mellow citizens mellows rate payers And you didn't use it on their behalf by putting it into inflow and infiltration. And regarding this idea that it's a program, not a project anymore, well, excuse me, all they're proposing to do is the same status quo of taking whatever money the MWRA allocates and using that money. We will get no better off. We will be sitting here talking about ridiculously high, highest in the country level water rates and sewer rates for years and years. if you don't take a leadership role take this job seriously and make this city do something instead of rubber stamping whatever comes before you thank you

▶ 22:15 Speaker 1: thank you mr. Morales anybody else who wishes to speak this evening motion to

▶ 22:19 Speaker 1: close public participation mr. president Alderman Mortimer moves to conclude public participation second motion seconded by Alderman Lemmerman on the motion all those in favor all right anyone opposed motion passes public