ORDER-2016-59 : An Appropriation of $1,169,941.66 from Available Free Cash to the Snow & Ice Deficit as set forth within.

Transcript (~6 min @ 1:45)

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▶ 1:34 Peter D. Mortimer: There's no roll call taken in the Appropriations Committee, so we will proceed directly to the orders before us this evening. The first order we have before us is order 2016-59. It is an appropriation of $1,169,941.66 From available free cash to the snow and ice deficit as set forth herein.

▶ 2:03 Gail Infurna: Motion to suspend the rules to ask Mr. Shannon to come up with it.

▶ 2:07 Peter D. Mortimer: Second. We have a motion to suspend the rules made by Alderman Inferno, duly seconded by Alderman Boycelle, to hear from the appropriate administrative and city personnel to come forward and enlighten us on this order. We see Mr. Della Russa was stepping forward, we see Mr. John Shannon was stepping forward. They are our chief financial officer and our director of public works, respectively.

▶ 2:43 Speaker 1: Please proceed. Thank you, good evening.

▶ 2:50 Speaker 1: Very pleased to be here, particularly in this regard to this order. As everyone is aware, we had a horrendous winter, and the city spent just under $2.5 million on snow and ice.

▶ 3:19 Speaker 1: was historic and um we were able to close that gap within this amount of money 1 million 169 941 66.

▶ 3:30 Speaker 1: i met with the department of revenue on monday and we conferred and what i'm asking the board to do respectfully but to approve this appropriation that will eliminate the snow and ice deficit that the city had and we will not have to raise it on the tax recap thank you very much

▶ 3:51 Peter D. Mortimer: mr delarusso mr shannon would you like to add anything before we proceed to questions and comments no we can proceed questions thank you very much sir first in queue we have alderman

▶ 4:01 Robert A. Boisselle: boycelle please in the news for the past couple days there's been an announcement that fema will be giving the state of Massachusetts a good portion of money to cover us for this ice and snow storms that we've been having this past year by paying this off now will we still be available for funding from this particular pot of money that's coming in yeah through the chair absolutely

▶ 4:24 Speaker 1: we've actually anticipated over 333 000 coming back between FEMA and MEMA in support of the deficit that we incurred last year so we i'm working with uh dpw and that's going to be coming in it actually started to come in now so we are going to get our relief money with the hopefully

▶ 4:47 Robert A. Boisselle: by the end of the fiscal year we should have it in very good and john in this snow and ice deficit have all the vendors been paid or we are we still owing money to any anyone at this point no

▶ 4:58 Speaker 2: everyone's been paid everyone's been paid and the um the folks have been closed on last winter these are our expenses and in their entirety thank you thank you mr chairman thank you

▶ 5:09 Peter D. Mortimer: alderman boyce hell president khan please yeah um i'm going to support this order um

▶ 5:14 Speaker 3: it's a shame that we have to spend this much much money on snow and ice but as everybody in this room knows we have no choice if we don't spend this money money will be taken away from us by the state I guess I'm thankful that we have this free cash to spend so that it doesn't create a further burden on us going forward and we will have little or

▶ 5:44 Speaker 3: no snow I'd move to recommend this order please mr. chairman second all president

▶ 5:48 Peter D. Mortimer: Kahn has made a motion to recommend this order for passage the motion was duly seconded by Alderman Inferna seeing no further discussion on discussion is is that a did you retract I just had a question okay Alderman McAteer-Margolis has a quick question thank you mr. de la Russo I

▶ 6:07 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: know sometimes we pay the balance from our next year's budget so that won't be required is that correct now you know it's like the first thing we have to pay

▶ 6:23 Speaker 1: when we set the budget for next year yeah right right now respectfully to the board um the chair what will happen is that we will essentially be entering the new fiscal year without this deficit on our back the state provided up to three years to pay this i don't want to do that i never want to do that and i think that by the collective action of this board we're able to process this and remove that liability for the next two second or third year if we in fact carried any of it

▶ 6:56 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: forward which i think would not be a wise move so great thank you i i think that's um a great reason to support it so that we know we don't we have that monkey off our backs for absolutely absolutely

▶ 7:06 Peter D. Mortimer: thank you mr chairman thank you alderman mcateer margolis all in favor of the motion duly seconded for passage to recommend for passage please say aye aye aye any opposed hearing none This order is passed and will be recommended to the full board for our next full board meeting on December 21st. And just before you step off, Mr. Shen, I just wanted to say a quick thank you. You did an amazing job last year getting the personnel. Many of the neighboring communities, I'd speak to friends who live therein, and they'd say they could tell the difference when they came into Melrose. The streets were much better. Your people, under your leadership, did a fantastic job last year under the worst of conditions. Thanks, I'll- Thank you very much, sir. I'll pass that along, thanks. You're welcome. The next order we have before us is order 2016-53. It is an appropriation in the amount of 6,000, God bless you, $848.39 from sewer retained earnings to various sewer counts as set forth herein. We're still under suspension and Mr. Della Russa was still here. Please proceed, sir.