ORDER-2015-192 : Amending Melrose Revised Ordinances, Chapter 228-14 by adding paragraph C relative to Water Meters as set forth herein.

Transcript (~8 min @ 43:13)

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▶ 43:12 Speaker 3: Aye. Anyone opposed?

▶ 43:15 Speaker 5: That order will be placed on file. Madam Clerk, could you call the calendar, please?

▶ 43:20 Speaker 10: Order 2015-192, amending Melrose Revised Ordinances, Chapter 228-14 by adding paragraph C relative to water meters as set forth herein.

▶ 43:31 Speaker 5: This comes from the Legal and Legislative Committee with a recommendation to place on file. Is there discussion relative to this order?

▶ 43:43 Speaker 5: alderman medeiros then alderman bird yeah i'll defer to almond bird alderman bird you have the

▶ 43:49 Jaclyn L. Bird: floor uh mr president i was just going to ask that we take uh order 2015-192 and order 2015-194

▶ 44:00 Speaker 6: um kink for uh concurrent action so that we can discuss them at the same time

▶ 44:05 Speaker 5: alderman bird is moving for concurrent action on two fifteen one nine two next two and two fifteen one nine four is that what you meant to move alderman i'm sorry no let's take that back and

▶ 44:20 Speaker 5: i'll do it for the next two i'm sorry mr president okay we are back we are back on order 215192

▶ 44:27 Monica C. Medeiros: alderman medeiros you have the floor thank you uh for uh asking for discussion mr president uh in this order i had submitted this order uh the the gist of it it may not be clear in what was read in the calendar this is to allow meters to be installed in any non-owner occupied unit as recognized by the assessor's office and my reason for bringing this forward was because i had received some feedback from people in the public who own property and are unable to individually have been told by the city that they're unable to individually meter some units that they may own as non-occupied non-owner occupied units this is in you know could be commercial residential and so on they were told that they were not allowed to do so because of the city not wanting to chase after tenants for billing purposes this state further states that

▶ 45:39 Monica C. Medeiros: the owner of a unit would be responsible for the payment on any any units any meters in the buildings i think this is a common sense solution we did have some discussion in our committee meeting by our city solicitor and our department of public works head and although

▶ 46:05 Monica C. Medeiros: they've mentioned that you know this would obviously even out some of the tearing they

▶ 46:18 Monica C. Medeiros: didn't really in my eyes address the legality or any anything towards that so I would like to see this move forward I think it's a common-sense solution I think the committee members here for moving to place this on file i would like to see this move to be for passage so um and a point of

▶ 46:37 Speaker 5: information i don't believe there's anything in our ordinance which supports the the statements by whoever made the statements that you can't install second or other meters yes i i think

▶ 46:51 Monica C. Medeiros: that that is uh correct but i'm not sure why that why uh homeowners and property owners are being

▶ 47:05 Speaker 5: told that further discussion relative to this order alderman inferno thank you very much mr

▶ 47:08 Gail Infurna: president um i wasn't here for the discussion i happened to be on vacation but i did watch it um and i was a little bit i was a little bit confused i guess and didn't quite understand what it all meant so i guess with that being said and knowing that we do have a water committee that does meet i would like to see these orders being sent to the water committee for them to um discuss it and whatnot i know we have um some information here from the consultant but i would like to see the water committee really look at it and see what they think about it and come back

▶ 47:48 Gail Infurna: with some sort of recommendation on it that's that's my motion that's where no further discussion

▶ 47:51 Speaker 5: second yeah so i understand like the motion is is it's a motion to table this order well to remand

▶ 47:57 Gail Infurna: it uh to send it to the um water committee and i guess remanded and in committee and in what's

▶ 48:09 Speaker 5: it appropriations uh legal and legislative legislative take alderman alderman inferna is moving that this order be remanded to the legal and legislative committee pending a review of the order by the water rate setting committee is that an accurate uh recitation of your motion thank you second second motion is seconded by alderman wright is the discussion relative to

▶ 48:36 Francis X. Wright Jr.: the motion alderman wright i i would appreciate if we're going to send this back to committee and ask for the input of the water commission that the information we've been provided by by the consultant be fleshed out we get a little bit more detail when he talks about what that they could be increases that this would result in if I'm reading this correctly in a very large increase in the first and second step rates and a reduction in the third step rates and that single-family homeowners would receive a double-digit rate increase in their annual bills while commercial apartment buildings would have their annual bills reduced um i'd like to see some percentages or numbers to go along with that so you're making a friendly amendment that as we send this back to the water and sewer rate setting committee that the consultant be asked to explicate the findings that are set forth in his report yes mr president we have a member of this board who attends those meetings and i would hope that that member could spur that discussion on

▶ 49:48 Speaker 5: is there further discussion relative to the motion that's before the board at this time alderman

▶ 49:54 Monica C. Medeiros: medeiros yes and just to uh further reiterate alderman Wright point um there was some discussion at our committee meeting that we didn't know in fact how many units this would actually affect mr shena said he he didn't know how many units this this could affect uh how many meters that would be and you know i'd like to know things about how many requests they've received right

▶ 50:20 Speaker 5: respectfully i think if we send it back there'll be a discussion of these things and i i do with respect i don't really think we need to list every potential question that we would ask them but if if we send it back and ask for more explanation and if people who are interested attend the water rate setting committee meetings they could ask their

▶ 50:44 Speaker 5: questions in person anything else relative to this water okay there's a

▶ 50:49 Speaker 5: motion to remand it to committee into with the the caveat that it be referred to the water rate setting Commission all those in favor of the motion indicate by

▶ 51:02 Speaker 5: saying aye aye anyone opposed that order will return to the legal and legislative