ORDER-2016-75 : Acceptance of a grant in the amount of $1,000 to conduct a Community Mapping Project of tobacco retailers and their proximity to schools, parks, and playgrounds, said funds to be deposited in fund number 2885.

Transcript (~11 min @ 1:12)

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▶ 1:08 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: tonight we have one item on our agenda it's order 2016-75 the acceptance of a grant in the amount of one thousand dollars to conduct a community mapping project of tobacco retailers and their proximity to schools parks and playgrounds said funds to be deposited in fund number 2885.

▶ 1:36 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: motion to recommend second we have a motion to recommend by alderman Boisselle a seconded by

▶ 1:44 Gail Infurna: alderman inferna is there discussion on the order suspension of the rules to have um maybe ruth clay

▶ 1:47 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: come before us thank you alderman inferna motions to spend the rules second seconded by alderman McAteer-Margolis and we have Ruth Clay here to speak to us about this order thank you very much for coming no problem would you like to tell us a little bit about it or would you prefer to go straight to questions I can

▶ 2:04 Speaker 2: briefly we've got this grant again last year it's for the chapter 84 group at

▶ 2:16 Speaker 2: the high school which is a tobacco prevention group and any community that has a chapter 84 chapter has is eligible for these $1,000 grants and they they give you a list of projects that you can choose from and you put in your first second and third choice and sometimes they honor those and sometimes they don't this was one of the projects that the kids pointed out that they wanted to

▶ 2:45 Speaker 3: do Alderman Inferno thank you could you maybe go into a little bit more details

▶ 2:52 Speaker 2: as much as you can um about the project well it's pretty straightforward the um basically the idea is to look at where tobacco products are being sold in relation to youth where youth congregate

▶ 3:09 Speaker 2: so um in our case you know we happen to have the middle and high school right near

▶ 3:20 Speaker 2: a commercial area not that's not always the case so we have three three three retailers very close to the middle and high school but we only actually the number of retail tobacco tobacco retailers in melrose has decreased significantly over the past several years at one point we had I believe it was about 22 retailers, and we were down to 11, and we're up to 13 because of the vaping store and the new Main Street variety. But 13 is a far cry from the low 20s, so it's been interesting to watch.

▶ 4:07 Speaker 4: Alderman Inferner, any other questions?

▶ 4:09 Gail Infurna: when what would happen after you map these these merchants out or these

▶ 4:18 Speaker 2: places retail is out well the youth will make a presentation they can make it to the Board of Health they can make it to the Board of Aldermen or the school committee and the idea behind this is to have the kids really involved with tobacco control and all the different issues our group at the high school has been really involved this past year they made a present to presentation to the Board of Health I can't talk tonight I don't know presentation to the Board of Health urging the Board of Health to prohibit the flavored tobacco products and the minimum pricing for cigars and cigar aloes they also came to the Board of Health when the board was considering the tobacco 21 so our group is is very very plugged in to the issues they participate a lot we have five youth going to Washington again this year to the CADCA program which is a substance abuse prevention leadership program in Washington DC that covers all different kinds of substances including tobacco the the youth that have come in the past

▶ 5:37 Speaker 2: have really they've done us so proud they have met with senators and representatives aides as well as Senator Warren and Senator Markey and Senator Brown in person they are they are elegant eloquent and they are passionate and they're very professional sounding and it's it's a fantastic opportunity for them and we have another five going this year this will be the last year we do that because it's the last year of our grant funding and it's it's expensive to do this well thank you for all the work that you're doing and you

▶ 6:14 Gail Infurna: know kudos to the kids for getting out there and making more awareness of the tobacco industry and the dangers of it and and you know what it can do with that I use though thank you very much all set thank you thank you I think we

▶ 6:35 Robert A. Boisselle: have Alderman Boyce on next when will this presentation be is it in spring or

▶ 6:38 Speaker 2: no I it would probably be in the fall in the fall yeah okay so the members that

▶ 6:43 Robert A. Boisselle: these students that are involved they're seniors juniors or well obviously the

▶ 6:50 Speaker 2: seniors wouldn't be here right all the rest of the kids would be here yeah our tobacco group ranges we have we have kids from all the grades now is there a

▶ 7:00 Robert A. Boisselle: limitation of is there a limit or range for cigarette selling at this point we

▶ 7:07 Speaker 2: do not have it there are I don't know there are communities that have restrictions that you can't sell alcohol within a certain number of feet I remember Cambridge I don't they still do remember Grendel's Den was the big issue in my day I'm not I don't know of any communities right now that prohibit sales of tobacco within a certain number of feet of a school there are communities that limit the number of tobacco permits they will give out in the community overall it's not something the board's really been interested it's probably the only part of the state model regs that we really haven't really looked at.

▶ 7:55 Speaker 5: Very good. Thank you very much. Thank you, Madam Chair.

▶ 7:58 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: And next up, we have Alderman McAteer-Margolis.

▶ 8:00 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: Thank you. Most of my questions have been answered, but I just did wonder, are the students themselves doing the community mapping?

▶ 8:06 Speaker 2: Oh yeah, absolutely, with their advisor.

▶ 8:08 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: With their advisor, so yeah. Are they utilizing any particular information from the assessor's office thing, or are they just gonna go around throughout the community?

▶ 8:18 Speaker 2: think they're gonna be going around through the community but they're going to do things like take pictures and pictures of a park or a school from the front door of the convenience store so you can see the vantage point and what it looks like from their perspective well having having worked with those

▶ 8:42 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: students on the substance abuse prevention coalition I know they're a great group and I was there when they presented to the Board of Health and they are very articulate so I'm sure they'll be successful it would be nice

▶ 8:58 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: to hear back from them thank you thank you and alderman materials thank you

▶ 9:00 Monica C. Medeiros: most my questions also answered but this is non matching that's correct right no matching and just a thought that came up during that discussion has anybody ever taking or maybe this could be included in some of the pictures that how many cigarette butts for instance might be in those parks that are that are near

▶ 9:25 Speaker 2: actually yes we have done that when we had the photo voice project that was funded also through a different grant and the kids had a actually a professional photographer come and coach them with their photography and they went around the whole community to look at positives in the community and negatives in the community and I distinctly remember that at least one of the photos was of cigarette butts thank you okay I think we've heard from all

▶ 10:02 Michael P. Zwirko: voting members Ottomans Erica I just had two quick questions can you help me understand the the newer tobacco practice e-cigarettes are those are cons I mean it's there's not a leaf in the product but it is still considered

▶ 10:15 Speaker 2: tobacco for sale they are nicotine they're considered nicotine containing devices and we amended our regulations so that our tobacco regulations also extend to nicotine delivery devices so currently in the city of Meadows you

▶ 10:34 Speaker 2: need to be 21 to purchase those absolutely okay and and Wakefield in winchester and i believe malden and is there any type of um if i was to be a retailer of tobacco

▶ 10:46 Michael P. Zwirko: product is there any type of training that i need to go through like i would for food service

▶ 10:53 Speaker 2: in order to sell that product not in the same way as food service where there's a national exam that you have to the serve safe exam but anybody who starts to sell tobacco in the city of melrose gets a personal training one-on-one with maureen busby our tobacco person as well as given literature the chains um have their own um tobacco training that involves watching a video i know carmel and farms does i know most of the chains do we really have more independent retail stores here so no but yes and Melrose they do get training thank you

▶ 11:43 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: any other aldermen have questions okay we have a motion to recommend that's been seconded all in favor aye any opposed okay that will be recommended to the full board you know the procedure but our next full board meeting is tuesday the 19th which is when we'll take this up motion to adjourn second we have a motion to

▶ 12:01 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: adjourn by bob weisel a seconded by monica medeiros all in favor aye we are adjourned