▶ 17:41 Devin Romanul: All right. Thank you, Kathy. All right. That concludes transfers. We are now moving on to our departmental budget presentations for FY27. First up is Department 145, Treasurer Collector.

▶ 17:54 Devin Romanul: And joining us is Katherine Armata, our treasurer collector.

▶ 18:03 Speaker 5: Good evening, councilors. Good evening. You've received my memo and know that there will be six budgets to review tonight that are associated with the Treasurer Collector Department. Before presenting them, I'd just like to give you a little bit of background on the department, provide some context, and then we can address each of the budgets.The mission of the Treasurer-Collector Department is to ensure timely collection of revenues, invest and disperse funds appropriately, and maintain fiscal responsibility while supporting the city's borrowing needs. The department consists of six people responsible for the collection of real estate, personal property, and excise taxes, parking violation fees, and water sewer bills, the booking of all revenues, payroll processing, tax payments, management of the parking program, the issuance of W-2s, quarterly government filings, and conducting the tailings process. The collection side is the public-facing side of the operation, and in addition to processing collections, they work with clients to resolve any issues, research payment histories, and provide closing attorneys with MLCs. The treasury side is more internally facing and books every receipt that we receive citywide. We also manage the investment of the OPEB and city trust funds and the debt program that funds all city projects or some city projects. As CFO Golden mentioned during her presentation, we are currently working with the Auditor's Department to transition the front end of the payroll process from the Auditor's Department down to Treasury Collector, where the whole operation will be housed going forward. There are a few things we accomplished this last year or are near to completing that I'd just like to highlight. One is just an individual initiative by one of my team members. Prior to the annual water liening, we realized that receivables were extremely high. So, she took it upon herself to contact every single resident who had an overdue water bill to remind them of that, walk through the options, provide them with assistance, and offer pay plans. Her efforts were generally well-received and benefited both clients and the city. And we collected approximately $250,000 in the following two weeks, so we were able to get our water liens at a normalized level. So, I just thought that deserved calling out. On the treasury side, we've been working with the Auditor's office to transition certain vendor payments to electronic form rather than issuing physical checks. This is an effort to get in front of any check fraud. Earlier in the year, we transitioned all the VA payments to ACH so that they receive it similar to the way they receive their Social Security payments. And we are in the process of working with a third party to systematically transition the vendor payments over time, starting with a few large, high-dollar payment vendor payments. And then another initiative is the conversion of the financial policies to Department of Labor Services' suggested format. A committee including the CFO, assistant auditor, city solicitor, and I are near to completing that project. This came as a recommendation in our DLS review of financial practices, and the formalization of the policies has always been an item on the... It's been highlighted by S&P, as it really should do. So, we're excited to get that behind us. And then finally, I'm pleased to say that we had a successful debt issuance in December to fund the first building phase of the public safety building project. The sale was for 30,566,025 year bonds and 26 million bond anticipation notes. The issuance of debt requires the input of many departments, from data to the offering materials, to developing the presentation materials, to actually presenting to S&P during the rating meeting. And I'm very grateful that we had the cooperation from all the departments in the city, because it enables our advisor to be able to do their job well, not chasing after things. So, we all came together and had a successful auction. And now on to the budgets. And through the Chair, how would you like me to do the budgets? One at a time, all six?

▶ 22:48 Devin Romanul: Yeah, I think maybe if we do it one section at a time, since we got to vote and ask questions on them one at a time. If you don't mind. Not at all.

▶ 22:55 Speaker 5: Number 145, which is the Treasurer Collector Department. This includes payroll, payments processing, maintenance and machinery. Postage for city is also included in the budget, as well as continuing education. Payroll looks like it's jumped up a little bit higher, but that's because we are including the payroll for the new employee in the department for 27. Postage was decreased this year because we only have two state elections. State elections are very expensive. Any election is very expensive. So, we're expecting less cost, even though the price is budgeted to increase. And then title fees are higher because there's been a change in the law in how you do tax titles. So instead of printing things in paper, which is getting very expensive, we now have to hire a constable to post on people's property. So, there's a shift between a couple of line items because of that. Mm-hmm. Those are the highlights.

▶ 23:59 Devin Romanul: Terrific. Thank you so much for the overview and the specifics on 145. Up first, I have President Freeman.

▶ 24:05 Bradley Freeman: Thank you very much, and thank you, Ms. Marotta, for being here. I just want to publicly discuss a conversation you and I had a couple of weeks ago, thank you for your efforts, and put it out about an issue that I think we're trying to actively find a solution for. And that is for taxpayers who pay their property tax out of pocket rather than through a mortgage company, they get two notices a year from the city, but make four payments a year. And I had a constituent reach out to me whoregrettably missed his May 1st payment, just because it's just slipped his mind, and he ended up receiving a demand notice from the city, along with some fines. And his request was not that he understood that he was late on his payment, but if there's some way for the city to work to schedule some sort of notification system for those taxpayers. And you and I discussed an opt-in email, where in the next tax bill, a notice can go out to all taxpayers that you can opt in for an email reminder one week before each quarterly tax bill is due. So, I don't think that'll have any impact on the budget other than that initial mailer, which will go out with the tax bills. But just wanted to give you the opportunity just to discuss that and see if that's something you thought we could do this tax bill that's going out this month, or is that six months from now?

▶ 25:10 Speaker 5: I think it's six months from now. Okay. I'll be running the bills next week. I do have a message into Tom Dalton, and I will push that to meet with him to determine the best way to move forward. In the past, we always post it on the city website, but you need a reason to go to the city website. The point of doing the mailings with two remits on them each year is because we need to contain costs. So, doing a quarterly mailing really isn't an option. We do try to remind people at the window, but of course, you have to come to City Hall. So, I believe that Tom does a text blast a lot, so I think that might be an option, but I will make sure to get it on the calendar to speak with him.

▶ 26:00 Bradley Freeman: Thank you so much. I know there are multiple reminders the city does send out around tax bills. This is just one more avenue- Yeah ... to reach those residents.

▶ 26:08 Speaker 5: There is also an electronic option through City Hall's systems. You can opt to receive a notice that your bill is going to be mailed. So, I find that helpful for some people, or you can just pay it, get a bill online.

▶ 26:22 Bradley Freeman: That's wonderful. Thank you very much.

▶ 26:24 Devin Romanul: Okay. Thank you. Up next, I have Councilor Park.

▶ 26:26 Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Ms. Romanul, for joining us. I just had a quick question with regards to the professional services. Now, not that I'm complaining, I noticed it was significantly lower than the previous year, or what was budgeted for this year and subsequently for fiscal year 2027. So, what accounts for the significantly lower cost in professional services? And is this something that we can hopefully look forward to moving forward in fiscal 2027? Are there things that you've been doing to help lower these costs? If you can elaborate.

▶ 27:01 Speaker 5: Sure. The answer is yes and no. They went down because we used to rely a lot on CliftonLarsonAllen to come in and basically look at our books. When I first took over this position about five and a half years ago, there were a couple of hundred outstanding accounting items that we had to research and fix, so we worked heavily with CLA, and we always built that into the budget. Then we implemented a munis reconciliation program, so it took a little bit to get used to the program and how to book everything correctly. Over this last year, we're under control. Everything is reconciling. So our cost for our consultant, Bailey, really reduced because I haven't seen her in five months, six months, something like that. So, that is one reason that it reduced. The reason I say yes and no is because there will be costs associated with this third-party system that we have. There are a lot of variables that we're not sure about yet. So, it does include an estimated cost of the treasurer's share of the third-party vendor cost for going electronic.

▶ 28:20 Speaker 6: Okay. Very good. Thank you very much, Ms. Romanul.

▶ 28:23 Devin Romanul: Perfect. Other questions from councilors?

▶ 28:27 Speaker 2: What is the will of the committee?

▶ 28:31 Speaker 6: I'll make a motion to move to bottom line.

▶ 28:35 Devin Romanul: Second. Motion made by Councilor Jamaleddine, seconded by Councilor Finocchiaro on discussion. Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 28:43 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Cal? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes.

▶ 28:55 Speaker 2: Councilor Williams? Yes.

▶ 28:56 Speaker 6: President Freeman?

▶ 28:57 Speaker 2: Yes.

▶ 28:57 Speaker 6: Chair Romanul?

▶ 28:58 Devin Romanul: Yes. All in favor. All right. We'll move the bottom line on 145. Up next, department 711, municipal debt.

▶ 29:09 Speaker 5: Through the chair, all of the debt kind of goes together, so I can talk about it and perhaps we do all of them. In my overview, I spoke about the bond issuance. That was exempt debt, other than a small amount that was for the roads. Exempt means it's exempt from the 5% limit of the budget on what we can pay every year. And the debt service of the bond is allocated over the real estate bills. So, the debt service due each year is paid from those additional tax collections. So, things shifted around a little bit because we issued over $50 million in debt. For 711, the municipal principal, that stayed basically flat to fiscal '26 at a little over 4 million. The amount of non-exempt debt decreased by about 154,000. Then we added exempt debt to the tune of 124 and a half, so they basically netted off for the year. We won't see the big impact on the principal payments of the exempt debt till next year. On the municipal interest, the scheduled interest payment is 3,438,476, which is about 1.8 million higher than fiscal '26, and that is because of the issuance of the debt.And then on the projected debt, that is also significantly higher at 897,362 versus, I think it was 320-ish thousand last year. And that's because we issued a $26 million one-year note, and we have to pay the interest on that when it matures. Just as a reminder, these are agreements we have with the bond owners. When we issue the debt, we basically promise if you buy our debt, we promise to pay you these amounts on this schedule over this period of time. So, these are the schedules per the agreements for fiscal '27.

▶ 31:20 Devin Romanul: Thank you very much. Any questions from councilors?

▶ 31:24 Jason Chen: Seeing none, what is that? Councilor Chen. Thanks for sending all the information to us earlier today. So how close are we to our 5% debt service limit?

▶ 31:34 Speaker 5: Oh, we have plenty of room. And the 5% is on the non-exempt debt?

▶ 31:39 Jason Chen: Right. Not public safety buildings, right?

▶ 31:41 Speaker 5: Right. And we haven't really issued any.

▶ 31:44 Jason Chen: It seems like one and a half percent we have left.

▶ 31:46 Speaker 5: We're at about, for fiscal '27, I have it estimated about 3.3%. So we like to keep it in the three and a half to four and a half range, not go all the way up to five for emergencies.

▶ 32:02 Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. Perfect. Other councilors?

▶ 32:07 Kimberly Vandiver: I make a motion to move department 711 to the bottom line.

▶ 32:12 Speaker 6: It's 711, 751. Sorry?

▶ 32:16 Kimberly Vandiver: Oh, sorry, 751.

▶ 32:18 Devin Romanul: Oh, I believe we're on 711 still. Oh,

▶ 32:22 Maya Jamaleddine: I thought they were combined. Through the chair, I think she combined three. She talked about the three that-

▶ 32:29 Ryan Williams: Point of order. We've been doing them individually, so unless we want to try and combine them, we'll just go through a quick vote one at a time.

▶ 32:37 Devin Romanul: Yeah. Unfortunately, we have to do each individual line item. So we're on 711 right now. Certainly, questions have spanned in and out a little bit, but I believe we have a motion on the floor to move to the bottom line on 711. Second. Seconded by Councilor Karamcheti. On discussion? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 32:55 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kohl? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes.

▶ 33:08 Devin Romanul: Chair Romanul? Yes. All in favor. All right. We'll move the bottom line on department 711. Up next, department 751, municipal debt interest.

▶ 33:17 Speaker 6: Make a motion to move the bottom line.

▶ 33:18 Devin Romanul: Second. Motion moved bottom line made by Councilor Finocchiaro, seconded by Councilor Williams. On discussion? Councilor Chen. Thank you. What would it take for us to go from AA+ to AAA+?

▶ 33:31 Speaker 5: Well, we're doing the financial policies. OPEB is big. That's a big obligation that we get dinged on. S&P right now seems to be difficult to get an upgrade at this point, but we keep trying year after year . So we will go for it again next year.

▶ 33:56 Speaker 2: Any other councilors on discussion?

▶ 33:58 Devin Romanul: All right. We have a motion on the floor. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 34:02 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kohl? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Williams?

▶ 34:14 Speaker 2: Yes.

▶ 34:14 Speaker 6: President Freeman?

▶ 34:15 Devin Romanul: Yes. Chair Romanul? Yes. All in favor. All right. We'll move the bottom line on 751. Up next, department 752, projected debt. Councilor Williams. I would just like to make a motion to move the bottom line on department 752, Chair Romanul. Second. Motion made by Councilor Williams, seconded by Vice Chair Vandiver. On discussion? Councilor Chen. Thank you. Can you explain what this is? Maybe you did, but I don't understand what- Projected debt

▶ 34:42 Speaker 5: ... projected debt is. Projected debt, that's the short-term debt- Could you just speak into the microphone, please? I'm sorry. I'm having a hard time hearing you. I'm so sorry. Projected debt is the BAN. The 26 million we did for one year. So the 897, is that the number, is the interest we will pay at the maturity of that, and we'll manage that maturity and, depending on what the cash flow needs are, either roll another BAN short-term, roll out, and do some more longer-term bonds to fund the next phase of the fire building.

▶ 35:12 Jason Chen: So this was, we got a loan while we were waiting for all the paperwork.

▶ 35:18 Speaker 2: Yeah. The BAN is a temporary additions?

▶ 35:21 Speaker 5: It's called temporary debt because it's not long-term debt. It's just a-

▶ 35:26 Jason Chen: It's a bridge to before you start your bond in action?

▶ 35:29 Speaker 5: Well, it's a real note out in the market. People are bidding on it. What we use it for is to manage the cash flows on a project. Because say you want, what did we issue, 55 million? Costs change over time, so you don't want to issue $55 million of 25-year debt all at once. You want to be able to say, "Okay, in a year, let's take half of that, and we'll be able to manage that cash flow better. We'll have a better idea of what the next phase is going to be, and we can manage that." So they call it temporary debt and interest.

▶ 36:06 Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. Okay. Perfect. Other questions by councilors?

▶ 36:10 Devin Romanul: Seeing none, we have a motion on the floor for 752. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 36:15 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kohl? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes.

▶ 36:26 Speaker 2: Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman?

▶ 36:28 Speaker 6: Yes. Chair Romanul?

▶ 36:28 Devin Romanul: Yes. All in favor. All right. We will move the bottom line on 752. Up next, department 916, Medicare city portion.

▶ 36:36 Speaker 5: Okay. Medicare city portion is budgeted up 5% at 1,099,040This is our best estimate at the time the budget is submitted. We have four union contracts being negotiated right now, which will have an impact. At the time, we didn't have the new insurance rates, which just went into effect last week on the payrolls. So what you see before us is our best estimate at the time, and should we need additional funds in the future, we will be back to you.

▶ 37:06 Devin Romanul: Terrific. Thank you very much. Questions from councilors?

▶ 37:13 Ryan Williams: Seeing none, what is the will of the committee? I have a question. Councilor Williams. Thanks. Do you foresee a lot of risk given the federal instability around these programs? And I ask this question broadly because I don't really know what our exposure could be, but I'm interested to know if in your professional network there's any conversations about impacts to municipal finance.

▶ 37:40 Speaker 5: I really haven't heard any. Okay.

▶ 37:42 Devin Romanul: Well, that's good. Yeah. Then thank you. Actually, I have a question. About the differential between what you're seeing in your annual projections versus what the costs end up coming in, do we end up coming reasonably close every year? Is there an explanatory variable, just so we think about potential reallocation of resources further into the fiscal year?

▶ 38:07 Speaker 5: If we went on a hiring spree, we would definitely go over. Yeah. I believe that we know what we need in the negotiations. So the folks who are doing that are going to be mindful of what our budgeting needs are in those negotiations. So, whatever has been brought before you in the past to say we need additional funds, those are the years where we didn't quite make it.

▶ 38:38 Devin Romanul: Got you. Yeah. All right. Thank you very much. Appreciate that. Any other questions? What is the will of the committee?

▶ 38:46 Speaker 6: Make a motion to move the bottom line.

▶ 38:48 Devin Romanul: Second. Motion to move the bottom line by Councilor Finocchiaro, seconded by Councilor Kowal. On discussion? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 38:58 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kowal? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes.

▶ 39:09 Devin Romanul: Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. Chair Romanul? Yes. All in favor. All right. All in favor will move the bottom line on 916. Thank you very much. I think that concludes-- Oh, no. You're up for parking. My apologies. I jumped the gun. One more. All right, one more. Last but certainly not least , 296, parking.

▶ 39:28 Speaker 5: Yes. Parking includes the salaries of the parking clerk, and then processing costs, as well as the lease expense for the Grove and Myrtle parking spaces. Professional services are up a little bit. Those would be the cost associated with processing parking tickets paid by phone at the rail stations, et cetera. So that's our best estimate there. And currently, when we were budgeting, we budgeted the Grove and Myrtle flat at the time. It was in January.

▶ 40:08 Devin Romanul: Terrific. Up first, I have Councilor Kowal.

▶ 40:10 Speaker 5: So that is my question. So, when is that lease up, and do you anticipate that it'll stay at this level? I got an update from the mayor's office earlier this week. Yeah. Well, last week. And, the lease is up in June. Okay. And they are negotiating right now. The last time it was negotiated, there was a 20% increase that the city agreed to. This time, the church is asking for a 54% increase. So at this time, the city has asked them to go back and rationalize to us why such a large increase. That's all I know. Okay. Thank you. So you may be back in front of us, depending on how that goes? I could, depending on how things go. Okay.

▶ 41:02 Jason Chen: Councilor Chen. Thank you. Approximately how much revenue do we collect in parking per year?

▶ 41:06 Speaker 5: Revenue or net?

▶ 41:08 Speaker 2: Revenue. Or net, either way.

▶ 41:12 Speaker 5: Okay.

▶ 41:15 Speaker 5: Revenue is about 164,000. And when I updated my memo last month or so, the net was 77 after all expenses. It's now around 83, I believe.

▶ 41:34 Speaker 2: Thank you.

▶ 41:36 Devin Romanul: Other questions. Councilor Jamaleddine.

▶ 41:38 Maya Jamaleddine: Thank you. Can I follow up to Councilor Chen question? Would you happen to have the details in terms of how many were overnight parking versus how many were exceeding the time limit?

▶ 41:54 Speaker 5: For fiscal '26?

▶ 41:56 Speaker 6: Yes, for this past. Sure. This year.

▶ 42:04 Speaker 5: And again, this was a month or so ago. Overnight city lots was 172. The floating merchants are way down at only seven, when it used to be closer to 20. Train stations, 6,786.

▶ 42:25 Speaker 5: And that's the volume that we've had year to date.

▶ 42:28 Maya Jamaleddine: So 172 tickets issued?

▶ 42:31 Speaker 5: No, a hundred... Oh, tickets. I don't have them by location. No, but what is the- Those are permits.

▶ 42:37 Speaker 6: Okay. Permits. Yeah.

▶ 42:39 Speaker 5: Got it. I'm sorry.

▶ 42:39 Speaker 6: Okay. Thank you.

▶ 42:42 Speaker 2: Other councilorsWhat

▶ 42:46 Speaker 2: is the will of the committee?

▶ 42:49 Devin Romanul: Motion to move to the bottom line. Second. Motion to move the bottom line made by Councilor Karamcheti, seconded by Councilor Kowal. On discussion?

▶ 42:58 Speaker 2: Seeing none. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 43:00 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kowal? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes.

▶ 43:14 Devin Romanul: Chair Romanul? Yes. All in favor. All right, all in favor. We'll move the bottom line on 296. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Up next, 293, Memorial Hall. 693. 693? Oh, whoops. I don't know what I'm saying, too. All right. There's my one mistake for the night, folks.

▶ 43:31 Speaker 2: That's it. I'm allowed one.

▶ 43:49 Speaker 6: Good evening. Thank you for having us.

▶ 43:53 Speaker 4: Can you hear me?

▶ 43:54 Speaker 6: How's that? I don't have much to say. I'm here because I'm the interim

▶ 44:03 Speaker 6: chair of our board of trustees. I'm happy to be here. In one respect I'm not happy to be here because the reason I'm here is because we lost our former chair.

▶ 44:17 Speaker 6: Mary Sexton was a wonderful person. Mm-hmm. And I don't think you need to vote on that. And again, I'm happy to be here. Kathy will answer most of the questions, if you have any.

▶ 44:31 Speaker 5: Thank you. Hi. Kathy Piggot-Brodeur, just so you know. I'm here on behalf of the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Building, which is known in the business world as Memorial Hall. And I just want to highlight a couple of things from the memo that you received in online. That's part of the agenda packet, but there's a couple of things I wanted to call out. In terms of the trustees, the trustees board, as determined in 1912, was established. It has fiduciary responsibility for the building, which means policies all go through-- I do not make any policies. They dictate all the policies. And per the decree in 1912, two of the board members have got to be veterans, which one of the veterans is Mike McGolis, the other one is Chris Bernard. Memorial Hall has one executive director and four non-benefit eligible operations assistants that share a total of 42.5 hours, which means that I have 42.5 hours to schedule all of them. I can't go over that in any week. However, their schedules are event driven, so if I don't have July 4th week, we have no events, so they wouldn't work that week. So I bank those hours for the times, for example, in June, when it's recital month, where I'm booked every weekend and every night for dance recitals and dance rehearsals, or March, when I have a lot of concerts and fundraisers going on, and November, December, when I have the MSO, "The Nutcracker," and a bunch of schools come and do Christmas shows and fundraisers. So I bank those hours that they're not working so I can use them that hour. So that's why their schedule is very flexible. As of the memo, there'll be 224 events, but as of this morning, I had 226 events for fiscal year '26, an estimated attendance of over 45,500 guests that go through our building in fiscal year '26. As of this morning, I have 149 events on hold for fiscal year '27. And just so you'll understand when I say on hold, I don't count on anything until I have a rental application back, the deposit back, and a signed contract I can return to them. So that's why I say they've all received their rental applications for next year, but right now I have 149 that I've sent out. In fiscal year '26, as of May 1st, we had collected $147,260.10, and I anticipated a revenue of 12,000 more to come in between May and June, which I still am in track to get that. But again, until I have the money, until they pay me, I'll let you know at the end of June what I have. I don't count on anything till it's in my hands. My budget is level funded, as usual, except for the pro services line. Well, there's three lines. One line that's always, from previous years, that's always increased is my elevator budget, because that's an elevator service contract. And that is directly dictated by union rates, which I don't even know what those will be until July. So I work with Carrie to determine what that should be. And I usually come in pretty close. The second part of it is the salary line items that account for the COLA. And the third one is new this year, and that's because I had done some research, and I requested the city if I could have extra money to get a service contract for the control portion of the HVAC system. So I have someone coming in and looking at the controls constantly instead of me calling someone when, oops, the controls aren't working. How I know that is because the controls are run via my computer, and they're installed in the system down below in the basement, but I want someone to be looking at it on a regular basis. For the physical part of the unit, I have a PM, preventative maintenance service contract, and on the same idea, I want a similar one. So I did some research, and there is a company that will do it. At this point, I would happy to answer any questions you have regarding the fiscal year '27 budget.

▶ 48:47 Devin Romanul: First I have President Freeman, and then Councilor Williams.

▶ 48:50 Bradley Freeman: Thank you, Chair Monell. And thank you, Ms. Pickett Brodeur, for being here. As the Ward Four councilor, I am proud that Memorial Hall is in my ward. It's something I speak about frequently as a good city service. And I think there's two ways of looking at Memorial Hall, and the way I tend to look at it is it is a city service. So while there is a revenue component to it, I think it's more important that we're providing events here for the city, and for our residents to enjoy. And any revenue we bring in is an added bonus that goes to the bottom line of the city. So I think anything we can do to increase that revenue is always beneficial. But I do think we first need to look at Memorial Hall as that service. And you spoke a little bit about the busy season of November, December, March, and June. And as anyone who's tried to go downtown to a restaurant during that time can attest, you don't do it, because there's many times I've gone downtown forgetting there's an event at Memorial Hall and haven't been able to get into a restaurant. Whoops. So I do think it's a huge benefit to the city. The question I have for you is, during the quieter times of the year, what efforts is Memorial Hall undertaking to try to bring in various kinds of unique programming or events that maybe you can't schedule during the busy season, but during the quieter months of June, July, August, you could bring in some various utilization of the building?

▶ 50:04 Speaker 5: Well, one of the first things I did when I... It might be like eight years now, I'm not quite sure. Frank Oliveri and I got together, and I was not getting any rentals in July. First of all, people won't go to a fundraiser in July or a concert. They're just not going to go. And people who run them are usually on vacation. So July was dead for me. And so Frank Oliveri and I got together, the director of recreation, and we put our heads together and he said, "I have an idea. Why don't we put a robotics program in there?" And I'm a robotics mom, so of course my eyes lit up. I was like, "Absolutely, we can figure this out." So we started out doing two weeks, and how it works is Monday through Friday, I set up the building for just the robotics group. They're in the main hall and on the stage. And it's two groups, and they sold out immediately. And so then we increased it to three weeks. Last year, we increased it to four weeks. And so this year, for the entire month of July, I'll have four full weeks. And that was a month when there was nothing going on, nothing coming in. And I always say the expression, "What's the most expensive room in a hotel? The empty one." So, that was a great way. And we have since then... When I say I have slow months, I have slower months, but most of the months are pretty well booked up, in terms of weekends. January and February is when I get a lot of events for February and April, those two slow months. And that's because I believe people are out at Christmas parties thinking about, "Oh, we should do this," because I will get tons of phone calls in January saying, "Do you have this date open? I want this date. Can I have January 30th?" So that's a month I never-- I try and stay there in January, I couldn't this year, but, to get them. But it's just a way that I can promote, I can bring in more revenue and more events.

▶ 51:57 Bradley Freeman: Awesome. And I neglected to mention earlier that I attended Civics Day at Memorial Hall- Yeah ... last week or two weeks ago, and it was a great event. And I think it's, again, that's a great service that Memorial Hall can provide, letting those kids come to City Hall, but having a place to gather as a group and as a class of 300. So thank you very much.

▶ 52:14 Speaker 2: Thank you. Up next, I have Councilor Williams. Thank you. Excuse me. So I wanted to ask, I'm noticing in the budget that

▶ 52:21 Ryan Williams: there's no capital outlay for a building that has a lot of capital expenses. And I wanted to ask if you have access to other capital outlay contracts, like there was a masonry contract, or if you do not have access to those contracts or those, I'm sorry, those budget lines.

▶ 52:41 Speaker 5: Actually, DPW put in, as part of the capital outlay, they put in as part of theirs. I worked with them. Because they're doing sidewalks and exteriors- Yeah ... they are going to do the... They put in, if it happens, to fix the, I call it the portico. I don't know, it's the main entrance that you walk in. Because if you look at that, it's a little tilted. The back stairs has to get fixed. Also, the stairs over by the white double doors, so where the dancers, if you have dancers or if you've had musicians go in, they go in that door. And DPW has put it under theirs, because if any projects is done on Memorial Hall, it is not done within the Memorial Hall budget. It is done through planning and engineering and DPW because that's who does the projects for the city, so they would take care of the projects. I put in for, I requested if I could get $100,000 for lights as part of the capital improvement project underneath Memorial Hall, which planning and engineering and all that would help me do that. But it was put in for a state earmark. Mm. But I do not typically put in for projects. It's done under those departments.

▶ 53:53 Speaker 2: Okay.

▶ 53:55 Ryan Williams: I know we have a couple cash appropriations on the agenda tonight. We already did one. We're going to do another one. And I notice in your memo, too, you say your priority for FY27 is to put a timeline together for the GAR room. Yes.

▶ 54:14 Ryan Williams: So but I want to ask, what do you think we can do to accelerate renovations on the interior generally? And do you think that the envelope that we spent many years prior debating and funding and fixing, the roof envelope is now sufficiently repaired that we can deal with some of this, what looks to be like rotting and peeling paint that's all around the ceiling? Because what I notice, and I totally agree with Councilor Freeman that it's a fantastic space. I go there all the time. But every time I go there, I'm like, "Gosh, this place just looks terrible." And I don't want it to look terrible because it has such potential... to be a really interesting art deco-inspired space that is very unique for Melrose and really the whole area. So I want to see that ceiling stripped and repainted. I want to see those gold statues refinished. I want to see all this stuff done. What's it going to take to get there, and what do you think the timeline is for that?

▶ 55:11 Speaker 5: I'm going to start with the GAR. The GAR needs to get done, and I know you look at it and you see stuff, but I see this as structural- Sure ... like the ceilings and the corners- Mm-hmm ... which I'm sure I see more than anybody. Mm-hmm. And there was a plan put together for that. Mm-hmm. And unfortunately, when the budget cuts two years ago, we lost an engineer, so that could not be done. Mm. So until we get an engineer back, it's not going to happen. Now, the money at the time, the Friends of Melrose Memorial Hall raised the money for the GAR. They did not raise all of it, but the trustees voted to allocate, which they still kept allocated, it is earmarked $80,000 from the restoration fund- Mm-hmm ... so that we can complete the project. Once the city can get an engineer in place and can get the projects, then we can work on the GAR. I do not have a timeline for that. I wish I did. I'm hoping that at least I can get a timeline together next year to determine when it can start. As far as the large project, the large project, I don't have an answer for you of when that can get done, because I do know one thing. If that project gets started, there is not a sprinkler system in the building, and once the project, someone says we have to start doing ceiling- Sure ... it kicks in that the sprinkler system is going to have to be upgraded and so is the smoke alarm system. Yep. So that's a large project, and I don't have the answers to how the city would fund

▶ 56:32 Speaker 6: that. Well,

▶ 56:33 Speaker 2: I

▶ 56:35 Ryan Williams: would encourage in your conversations about planning to think about it as a major capital project in the same light that we think about the fire station, the public safety buildings, project managers, external consultants.

▶ 56:48 Ryan Williams: We've talked a lot around this horseshoe about all the money that we put into Memorial Hall. We've talked about how much we support Memorial Hall, and we also talked to the director of DPW, who did not give us any indication that an engineer was going to be hired anytime soon. I know. And so, if I had to choose between waiting six more years to hire an engineer and allocating a bigger chunk of free cash to project manage and get moving on it and get it done, I would choose the latter. That's what I would do. Personally, I would be willing to support more funds to Memorial Hall if we could make it look good on the inside.

▶ 57:24 Speaker 5: And I'm sorry, I didn't answer one of your questions also, I just realized. The project that we just completed- Mm-hmm ... that was the exterior project. Yes. And the roof was done, all the windows were done, and that did satisfy, so I do not get water in the building, which is huge. So at least going forward, there's not more damage from the water. Yeah. So a lot of that is from the water damage.

▶ 57:46 Speaker 2: Do you think you can't even paint, just scrape a little bit of the peeling

▶ 57:49 Ryan Williams: paint and paint without touching that building code issue?

▶ 57:52 Speaker 7: No. Really? No. Okay. All right.

▶ 57:56 Speaker 5: I tried. Okay.

▶ 57:58 Ryan Williams: Well, I think it's good. I'm glad you bring it up because I think it is something that people notice, and they ask about, and it's hard not to have an answer and say, "I don't know why it's not painted yet." But to know a little more- It's coming. It's right up ... information, it's helpful, I think, for all of us to be able to-

▶ 58:11 Speaker 5: Okay Thank you for asking.

▶ 58:14 Speaker 6: Yeah. Okay. Thank you.

▶ 58:15 Devin Romanul: All right. Up next, I have Councilor Porter.

▶ 58:17 Christopher Park: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Councilor Ryan had asked many of my questions, so I'll leave it to just one. Excuse me. So I noticed that in fiscal year of '26, that we've executed 224 events, and I think you just said it's now 226. And that's significantly lower than what we had the prior year, which was 259 in 2025. As you saw, and I think my fellow councilors saw, I asked a question what accounts for the drop, and you had explained that you took a leave of absence for eight weeks, I believe, and that accounted for a little bit of the drop.

▶ 59:00 Speaker 5: I took an FMLA.

▶ 59:02 Speaker 6: Yeah. Okay. Which accounted for some of the ability to not schedule, or it just created a little bit of issues with scheduling up to what we had done in 2026, or excuse me, in 2025. So my question then is for 2027, for your goals, you have the execution of a minimum of 2024 still. And I'm wondering, moving forward in 2027, do you anticipate another FMLA? Should the goal or the minimum be back up to 2025 levels of 2,060 events? I kind of want to go back on track as to where we were in sort of quote, unquote, "conventional and normal times."

▶ 59:56 Speaker 3: We certainly hope that Kathy won't have to have another FMLA. Nobody knows what will happen. But as you see by the numbers, the number of events was down, but revenue is up because we've seen a minor increase in the rehearsal rate during the year. And we anticipate some of the clients may not renew with us because of the increase in rates for '27. But the revenue should stay at least level to this year's, and hopefully will grow.

▶ 1:00:37 Speaker 5: And I also want to say that my goal for the following year is only going to be whatever I did this year, and I'm going to increase it from there. I'm never going to go backwards. So my goal this year is to do more than... The goal for fiscal year '27 is for me to do more than 226 events.

▶ 1:00:53 Speaker 6: That's wonderful to hear. I'm pleased to hear that. And as I had already asked and addressed, that you had addressed in the response, we have decreased the net loss significantly by 40,000, which I'm pleased to see. So we're in the right direction. I just want to make sure we're still headed that way. So thank you.

▶ 1:01:11 Speaker 5: Thank you.

▶ 1:01:13 Speaker 2: Up next, I have Councilor Kowal.

▶ 1:01:15 Elizabeth Kowal: You may have already answered all of this- Okay. ... in some of your other questions. That's all right. I'll answer it again. Yeah. I noticed when you answered those questions today, you said that we are still 30% below market rate. Yes. And so is there a plan to sort of-- Again, it's hard to do a quick jump, as I saw or I read into your memo with the rehearsals when you did that jump, rehearsal interest fell, right? So I understand that. And again, some of it may be because of the capital improvements that need to be made. I also understand that. But is there sort of a roadmap to continue to increase, or can we continue to increase our fees, and so that we can continue to close the gap in that? Because 30% is still pretty big, and I don't say that in a-- It is, and you know that, right? So is there a plan to hopefully continue to increase rates?

▶ 1:02:04 Speaker 3: Yes.

▶ 1:02:05 Speaker 5: My trustee's always going to say yes. I ask a simple question, that's what I get. But just so you know, before they increased it, it was a 50% market rate. Okay. The original was 50%. So we've closed the gap a little bit. Yep.

▶ 1:02:16 Speaker 3: We went many years without a rate increase, and we probably should've done small increases over the years, but we don't mind being a little below market. Okay. But we are trying to get it up closer to market rate.

▶ 1:02:33 Speaker 5: And the rehearsals, the rehearsals for 13 years, the cost of the rehearsals was $200 for four hours. That is less than what churches were paying. And then it went up to 500. So a lot of the people that were using me, instead of a church, because think about it, it's a much better venue, said, "Yeah, we're going to opt out of that." So I did lose a lot of rehearsals. I did lose a couple from Boston. I was getting a couple of bands from Boston that were coming out to rehearse because it was only two and an hour, and I did lose that. But for the most part, I did not lose clients when the rates went up. They still thought it was a bargain, so... Thank you. Thank you.

▶ 1:03:15 Speaker 2: All right. Up next, I have Councilor Karamcheti.

▶ 1:03:18 Manjula Karamcheti: Thank you so much. Thank you both for being here. Really appreciate it. I wanted to start by just saying, I also, like President Freeman, really see Memorial Hall as a service to our community. And I just wanted to take the opportunity to say how grateful I am to you and your team. I was part of the group that put on the Rocks and Ribbons event for Zachariah and his family, and being able to work with your team in such a delicate, sensitive, and hard situation was really meaningful. So just wanted to say how much I appreciated that. I went to the Pleumeneia Choral Society event on Saturday night. And I think when I go to Memorial Hall, I just think about how wonderful it is. I don't notice as many of the things as my colleagues, and I believe in an investment in it as well. So just wanted to say that I am supportive of that. I think the question that I had, in looking at your budget, I don't see, unless I'm missing it, any budget for marketing. And- I have $800. Okay. So the market sup is $800 for marketing. And I, one, so appreciate that when there are lighter interest, you and Mr. Oliveri came together and came up with this wonderful idea for robotics. But I worry that it's all on you to figure out how to make sure Memorial Hall is full. So I'm just wondering how we might more robustly market Memorial Hall, especially given it is a service, but I also think it is a space that has so much potential. I think I'm really excited to see the MAPC study so we can leverage the service, and a space like that just really, I think, has a lot of potential. And one of those pieces in terms of line item is, I don't necessarily think an $800 marketing budget is sufficient. We are not in a role to be able to add, but just in thinking strategically about Memorial Hall, I would love to see some more resources dedicated to that in the future. So I just wanted to take the opportunity to say that here, because it is- I agree ... such an amazing place- I agree ... with so much potential.

▶ 1:05:50 Devin Romanul: Up next, I have Councilor Furnario.

▶ 1:05:53 Cal Finocchiaro: Thank you. Councilor Williams actually sort of took what I wanted to ask and would say. But I do think that improving the interior, I know it's part of our capital improvement program, but it's almost like if we invested a little bit more on the interior of that building, maybe we would attract more private events like weddings- Mm-hmm ... showers, engagement par-- I don't know. I'm just trying to think, like less of the recitals, and those people tend to have a bigger budget. So it's sort of like you invest a little bit more, make it the space sort of what it was in the yesteryear, right? And then you can really kind of beef up those,

▶ 1:06:37 Cal Finocchiaro: the people that are booking it, or a different caliber. And it's great. You go back and forth. Obviously, we want to bring in revenue, but in my mind, I've gone over this a lot. It is a nice space where it's affordable for residents that want to rent it for, or a small dance company for recitals, right? So it's like we need to balance with raising the fees, which I think we should, like-how's it called? Said bridging that gap over the years. But it's also important to be a space for our community to go to and know that they're not going to pay top dollar to rent a space. I know the youth football program does their banquet there. I'm probably going to get yelled because I'm not speaking into the microphone. Sorry. I usually get texts on my phone saying that I'm not speaking into the microphone. So anyways, I think that we should really think about investing more into beautifying the space. That way we can, over the years, bring in more capital.

▶ 1:07:46 Speaker 5: One of the things that when I first came here, I used to call them quick hits, and it was the GAI room, and I would get a birthday shower, or a 60th birthday party, or a 50th birthday. And when those days were empty, I could throw in a quick hit. But because of the condition of GAI, it's just not happening as much. It has definitely gone down. But I agree with you. If we can fix it inside, then my quick hits could come back in the GAI room if I get that done.

▶ 1:08:13 Cal Finocchiaro: Absolutely. And I was reading some of the improvements. So do you have funding for the stage curtains to replace those or no?

▶ 1:08:21 Speaker 5: The trustees have allocated funds, so I'll go to bid to get that.

▶ 1:08:25 Cal Finocchiaro: Okay. And then so the stage lighting is an earmark. We're going to see if the grant comes through. Then the curtains, is there anything else that needs to be-

▶ 1:08:33 Speaker 5: No. Well, the sound system, but that's a huge... That's someone coming in and doing an evaluation- Mm ... of the building because it was designed and built for live music. We always run the risk of if we put dampeners on the wall so it doesn't echo as much, then that will hurt the Marlboro Symphony Orchestra who's been there- Right ... 108 years. Mm-hmm.

▶ 1:08:56 Speaker 3: And counting.

▶ 1:08:58 Speaker 5: But the sound system, that's not on my radar just yet because I have to bring in a consultant to figure out what we need, and then we'll go from there- Mm-hmm ... and figure out just how much. I suspect to do it right, you'd have to do the arrays. I don't know if you guys-- I worked at Bose- Mm-hmm ... Pro Products for 12 years. So you do those arrays- Mm-hmm ... and you have to align them in such a way that it's not bouncing around the room. But you also put temporary stuff up, but that would be a lot to go up. There's a sound consultant that'll come in, and then he's going to tell me exactly, or she's going to come in and tell me exactly what will work best for that room.

▶ 1:09:31 Speaker 6: Yeah, I was going to say, acoustics is everything in that space.

▶ 1:09:32 Speaker 5: It's a whole science. Yeah. It's a whole science. Mm-hmm. But you don't want to lose the live portion of it because the symphony doesn't have to have instruments on all their microphones because acoustically, it's perfect. Mm-hmm.

▶ 1:09:44 Cal Finocchiaro: That's great. And I know this past year was challenging for you in some ways, and I'm appreciative about the fact that you kept the numbers of events up as best as possible. We had a little bit of a dip back. And I know I had emailed about the MAPC study, so it'll be really interesting to see what they come back with because they're obviously going to have some good feedback about the space. And it will be interesting to see what they have to say.

▶ 1:10:13 Speaker 5: Yeah. And it's in draft version right now. Yep. The community and everybody will get it when it's finalized. And the bonus was a lot of the community participated in the surveys and the workshop. The value of it is high. Mm-hmm. The results.

▶ 1:10:27 Speaker 6: Great. Thank you.

▶ 1:10:28 Devin Romanul: Up next, I have Vice Chair Vandiver. Thank you.

▶ 1:10:30 Kimberly Vandiver: Just wanted to ask about your thoughts about the fees for the space or the various spaces, whether there's an option there to set the fee higher, but then have certain user groups that have a percentage reduction. So you don't have to lose the groups that- ... the student groups or the smaller groups that don't have that type of budget. Mm. You could even look at doing something like there's a certain fee, and you can book out whatever, 12 months in advance or however long you get it. And then it opens up three months in advance at the lower rate for these type of student groups or charitable organizations or anybody, smaller groups, however you want to determine that. But that might be a way to maintain availability of the space for everyone, but also bring in more from the groups that could support it.

▶ 1:11:26 Speaker 5: I'm going to let my trustee answer that.

▶ 1:11:29 Speaker 3: I think I speak on behalf of all the other trustees that we think Kathy does a phenomenal job over there. And she's the only one doing it. She doesn't have a marketing person. She doesn't have somebody to go out and set different rates for different groups, as you're suggesting. And I think that's a good idea, but I think those smaller groups are better served by going to somebody's house, which a lot of them do. They're not looking for Memorial Hall. And we have so many events, and most weekends, something's going on there. We've done weddings. We've done a little bit of everything. We've done everything from boxing to- Boxing. Well, I guess we haven't done any zoo stuff.

▶ 1:12:17 Speaker 6: But

▶ 1:12:20 Speaker 3: getting back to this whole issue of

▶ 1:12:25 Speaker 3: the Memorial Hall, the beautifying of the interior, we've waited many years to do that envelope project and get that done first so that we didn't do something inside and have a rainstorm or a snowstorm and have ice dams ruin the building. So we're ready to move now, and now we need to get a city engineer. So we're ready to go ahead full bore, but we need to figure out a way around this roadblock.

▶ 1:13:00 Kimberly Vandiver: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Understand that you need to work on that project as well.

▶ 1:13:04 Speaker 3: I got to confessEvery time I walk into that GAR building, I want to go over to that back wall, get a big ladder, get up there- ... and ride that thing down all the way- ...

▶ 1:13:16 Speaker 6: and scrape the wall and paint it. No. I want to do it here too. You can join him.

▶ 1:13:23 Devin Romanul: But, no. Yep. I bet we could sell tickets. Yeah.

▶ 1:13:25 Kimberly Vandiver: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. There you go. Fundraising.

▶ 1:13:27 Speaker 3: All these ideas are great, but- Yeah, it could be a fundraiser ... we don't have the answers, and like I said earlier, we have this roadblock now about doing the interior. So-

▶ 1:13:39 Kimberly Vandiver: Maybe something to file away for later.

▶ 1:13:42 Speaker 3: I'm going to talk to Kathy and we're going to talk about some ideas of maybe doing some of the things in the GAR that have to be done on a smaller scale that doesn't have to reach some kind of threshold- Mm ... and somebody has to say, "Bless it." So-

▶ 1:14:00 Kimberly Vandiver: I appreciate the work you do and the space you provide. Thank you. Thanks.

▶ 1:14:04 Devin Romanul: Terrific. Up next, I have President Freeman.

▶ 1:14:07 Speaker 6: Looking to make a motion to move to bottom line. Second.

▶ 1:14:09 Devin Romanul: Motion made to move to bottom line made by President Freeman, seconded by Councilor Karamcheti. On discussion, I have in queue Councilor Karamcheti, Councilor Williams, and Councilor Chen.

▶ 1:14:17 Speaker 5: I withdraw. I just wanted to make a motion to move to the bottom line as well.

▶ 1:14:21 Speaker 2: All right. Councilor Williams. I would also withdraw, but first I wanted...

▶ 1:14:26 Ryan Williams: What if somebody broke into Memorial Hall and fixed all the-

▶ 1:14:30 Speaker 3: Leave the back door open one of these nights.

▶ 1:14:32 Speaker 5: I think that's against the law. Just so you'll know. And I have cameras, so I will know.

▶ 1:14:38 Speaker 2: What if they broke in and painted everything? Oh my gosh.

▶ 1:14:39 Speaker 5: No, I have cameras. I know when anybody's at Memorial Hall.

▶ 1:14:42 Jason Chen: It's definitely not going to be you. I'm done. Thank you. All right. Next, I have Councilor Chen, unless you want to tell us where the spare key is in the back map. Thank you, Chair. What does this engineer need to do? Is it write the requirements to be able to bid it out?

▶ 1:14:58 Speaker 5: The planning department writes the requirements. The engineer oversees the day-to-day work of the project, the bidding process. Between engineering and planning, it's the bidding process, writing the scope of work for the bidding process so it's legal. The engineer oversees it. I did not oversee that exterior project. Someone had to be on site. I was on site, so if something went wrong, I could say, "I don't like this." But I had nothing to do with the project. They actually do the project. It's sort of, what's the term? Clerk of the works. Mm. You remember that term? Someone has to oversee the project on a daily basis. We met once a week with the contracting company and with the engineering department, I sat in in case they had any questions, and with the architect. And that's a full-time project. That's a project for an engineer. It's a lot of work for them. Bonnie Reese was the one who did it, and she spent a lot of time on that project. Now, when you have five major projects going on at once, that's a lot of work. So that's why I can't do it. That's not my role. I'm not an engineer. I'm a marketing major. There has to be someone that knows construction, knows the laws. There's all kinds of Massachusetts laws against what you can and can't do.

▶ 1:16:19 Devin Romanul: We have a motion on the floor that's been seconded. On discussion, I think I have everyone on queue, unless we have another question. Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 1:16:29 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Cal? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. Chair Romanul? Yes. All in favor.

▶ 1:16:45 Devin Romanul: All in favor? We will move the bottom line on 693-

▶ 1:16:49 Speaker 5: And I just want to say thank you, because this council is incredibly supportive of Memorial Hall, and I really appreciate that. Thank you.

▶ 1:16:55 Devin Romanul: We appreciate your stewardship of Memorial Hall, and thank you for your time.

▶ 1:16:58 Speaker 3: Thank you.

▶ 1:17:00 Devin Romanul: All right. Up next, we have the Recreation Department, 631.

▶ 1:17:09 Speaker 2: Thank you for joining us, Director Oliveri.

▶ 1:17:11 Speaker 6: Yes. Thanks for having me. Good to see everybody. I have a short statement just to address the budget that we're requesting tonight. The Recreation Department is requesting the restoration of $83,070 from the city's general fund to help support our operations. Each year, the Recreation Department serves over 4,000 participants, offers hundreds of programs and events, and gives out 60-plus scholarships to those in need of financial assistance. The 83,000 towards salary and wages will help support the shortfall that the Recreation Department experiences each fiscal year. For FY27, we project that salaries and benefits will come to around $230,000 for our department. Of that $230,000, the Recreation Department will cover approximately $150,000 of. This is after covering all program-related expenses. So basically, our profit afterwards. For the past two years, the Recreation Department was able to cover this shortfall thanks to a surplus that was slowly built up in the Recreation Revolving Fund over the past 20 years. However, it is not feasible for us to continue covering this amount, especially with the soaring costs we are seeing due to inflation and health insurance. Our health insurance alone was an increase of over $20,000 last year, which the Recreation Department 100% covers even as it goes up from year to year. Without the support of the general fund, the Rec Department would need to consider reducing services and drastically raising fees. However, this would most likely still not achieve covering this shortfall and this gap. The 83,000 before you this evening will be enough to cover our department for FY27 while keeping our programs and events affordable and available for our community. And then I'm happy to answer any questions that anybody might have on this.

▶ 1:19:04 Devin Romanul: Thank you very much. And I just want to say, on behalf of this council and past councils, appreciate your financial flexibility during our city's significant shortfalls in recent years that certainly did not go unnoticed. Sorry. Thank you for that. Yeah. Questions from my colleagues?

▶ 1:19:23 Speaker 2: President Freeman.

▶ 1:19:24 Bradley Freeman: Yeah, I just want to note that I had the opportunity to work with Mr. Olivera on the Parks Commission, and I was always really impressed with all that they did, to your point of dealing during the lean times and managing their budget through the revolving fund. And I just wondered if you could just expand a little bit now that some of the salary is going into the operating fund and the recreation department will have a little more flexibility. Are there any new initiatives we should be looking forward to in the coming year? Maybe outreach or programming for some of the populations that don't as often receive recreation programming, like, the elderly populations or other individuals in Melrose. Yeah. Thanks for the question. We're always interested in increasing programming. The real struggle for us over the past two or three years has been the demand for generating revenue. And so, the mindset has to shift slightly, right? So instead of offering free community programs or super inexpensive programs that are just about bringing community together to help build them, it was more about trying to keep the recreation environment going because we didn't want to lose those services that people really have grown to rely on, especially some of our bigger programs. And so with the restoration of these funds, we would be able to start to expand and look more at that. Where it's the first time in a couple of years that we can start to look at what are some of these other new ideas that maybe we've tabled

▶ 1:20:41 Speaker 6: that we can start to consider bringing back. And that includes also supporting families that might not have the means to do that. So keeping programs affordable is also really important. All right. The recreation department isn't about just generating funds. It's about being able to provide services that people can access. And so sometimes our department gets seen as sports heavy and as generating revenue and you could-- But that's not the mission of our department. It's about creating community through accessible ideas and programs and initiatives. So, the future will show what comes out of this, but all it does is give us more flexibility, as you pointed out, to increase all of our offerings. Well, I loved hearing about the program you did with Memorial Hall, Ms. Pickett Broder, and would encourage more programs like that and opportunities to partner with the Muano Center and other avenues throughout the city. So thank you for all that you do.

▶ 1:21:39 Speaker 2: Thank you. All right. Up next, I have Councilor Finocchiaro.

▶ 1:21:41 Speaker 6: Thank you. I just wanted to say thank you and also commend you for running with a $83,000 shortfall the past two years. I'm sure that wasn't easy. I also want to ask you, do you find that there's an age group in the city that you feel like we could have more programming towards? And forgive me, I've not looked at your programming - No, that's- ... recently. My three boys went through the Recreation Department. You guys were my savior during the summers, so I'd send them up to the Common to do their little soccer- Yeah ... kickstarts or something like that. But anyways, I just didn't know if there was an age group that you're looking to cover. The easy way to answer that is the age group is always the same. It's the middle school, high school age group, which, if anybody has a middle school or high schooler, it's very difficult sometimes to find something and create something and have that grassroots effort to actually get them to sign up and participate. It can be very challenging. And so we've really been trying to increase those offerings with a lot of different co-ed and sports-specific programming and just kind of gathering social type stuff that creates those safe spaces. But that's always remained a consistent striving point for us, is trying to increase that programming, along with our adult programs. So as I've mentioned, sports heavy can kind of happen. Indoor space is just as valuable as outdoor space. It's hard to find space. It's hard to get into a space and then try to create a program that's successful- Mm-hmm ... that's quality, and has everything that it needs. So, a long-winded answer to your question is middle school, high school is a main focus, but it's really ages 2 to 100 that- Mm-hmm ... and plus. We'll say 100 plus, just so I don't get in trouble with anybody. Yeah. But, it's the whole range. Yeah. But that's the main one. Well, I think we should put Julie Pino to work more. Yeah. I was actually going to ask you- I'll let her know if there's any... This is my last question was, do you do some sort of survey in this community to find out if people like if-- I know there's a lot of parents of zero to five that are looking for things, and I'm sure you have stuff in the program for that age group. But is there any way to kind of get any community input? Do you do that? Yeah. I'm glad you asked because we just put out a community survey this past spring, where we had over, I think, 300 participants fill out the survey, which was great because it was per family household. So you weren't just capturing data on one person. Mm-hmm. It was really times three, four, five, six people, whoever is in the house. And that was the most incredible part was it did show that it is the full spectrum- Mm-hmm ... that people are looking for. Now, the challenge of the Rec department is if you think about program offerings and how many different categories there are of different things to support and offer and how many different age groups, and then actually having the capability of doing that, that's another challenge that comes in. That's where staffing and financial support from the city comes in- ... because it allows us to kind of bring part-time or temporary seasonal staff on to try to help us- Yeah ... fill that. But it's always a little bit of a constraint for us because everybody wants everything- Mm-hmm ... but we can only offer what we can at the same time. Well, if you need volunteer flag football refs, I have someone that can do that very well. Fantastic. And I- You said the main word, "volunteer," so. Exactly. I'm sure there are other questions, but I'm just going to make a motion to move the bottom line. Thank you.

▶ 1:25:18 Devin Romanul: Motion made to move the bottom line by Councilor Finocchiaro, seconded by Councilor Karamcheti. On discussion, I have Councilor Williams. Thank you. I wanted to say that I appreciate your definition of your

▶ 1:25:31 Ryan Williams: mission, because I think that for a lot of folks, recreation has been just sports. And I think that's very important, and it's great, and it should be a majority of the work. But I do think it's really important to define the other forms of recreation that we can have in the city. And when you said that, it got me thinking, and one of the things that jumped into my mind was that in the elementary school level, we have a lack of social activities or extracurricular grouping activities that kids can do. And you do have more of that certainly at the high school level, but I'm thinking of things that are like chess club. Very small scale things that little, smaller kids can participate in. And I know that there are special challenges with the elementary schools and that age population, but that would be, I think, an interesting area to explore as to whether in-school elementary programming, like immediately after school is feasible for other types of recreation. Because I wished my kids had something they could do, a video game club, a chess club, something they could hang out for a little bit after school- Yeah ... 30 minutes or whatever. Mm-hmm. So. Thank you. Enrichment will- Enrichment. Sure. You... Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. A reading club, a book club, whatever. Yeah. Mm.

▶ 1:26:46 Speaker 2: All right. Absolutely.

▶ 1:26:47 Speaker 6: Yeah. Thank you.

▶ 1:26:48 Devin Romanul: All right. Terrific. We have a motion on the floor, seconded. Councilor Chen.

▶ 1:26:53 Jason Chen: Thank you, Chair. So, we chatted earlier today, and thank you so much for, as others have mentioned, making this a public good and not just a business. There are plenty of sports businesses and clubs that parents pay- ... a lot of money to. About robotics club, my son went. If he did not go, he would've been playing video games while I was at work. But instead, he went to robotics, came home excited with something to show us, went to his friend's house after, played outside, and then came home with a bunch of stories. So,

▶ 1:27:26 Jason Chen: I think I want to reiterate that we're making a decision to not raise rates because we want to keep it accessible for the most number of people, and we think that it's fair and a public good with all these follow-on positive effects. And while we can try to raise rates 15% and make this revolving fund neutral, it's a deliberate decision not to. Absolutely.

▶ 1:27:51 Speaker 6: Well said. Thank you.

▶ 1:27:54 Speaker 2: All right. Any other councilors? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 1:27:59 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kowal?

▶ 1:28:07 Speaker 5: Yes.

▶ 1:28:08 Speaker 6: Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. Chair Romanul? Yes.

▶ 1:28:15 Devin Romanul: All in favor. All right. All in favor will move the bottom line on 631. Up next, we have 2652, the recreation revolving account.

▶ 1:28:24 Speaker 6: Yes.

▶ 1:28:25 Devin Romanul: Any additional commentary beyond what you stated?

▶ 1:28:28 Speaker 6: No. Every few years, we have to raise the recreation revolving fund because expenses go up. So, the revenue is always there to support the expenses, but especially with us covering the lack of funding from the general fund the last two years and now the increases that we're experiencing, this would allow us to be able to cover the expenses that come up throughout the year. It doesn't mean we're going to go up to 575,000, but with 85 to 90% of our operating funds coming out of the rec revolving fund, this is usually the process. Great. And then any question, I'm happy to...

▶ 1:29:16 Devin Romanul: Thanks so much. Up first, I have Councilor Williams. Thank you, Chair Romanul.

▶ 1:29:20 Ryan Williams: So, you're talking about raising the spending limit. We're not there yet, but we will be later. We're just talking about approving the $500,000 fund that it is right now for fiscal year 2026, and then we have an order later in the agenda where we're going to talk about raising that fee for FY26. But you brought it up, and I think the two are connected, so I'm going to ask you a little bit more about that. And then what we'll do is we'll vote on the fund, and then after the budget hearing, we'll vote on that increase- Mm ... for $75,000. It's weird. I wouldn't even try to

▶ 1:29:54 Speaker 2: like...

▶ 1:29:55 Speaker 6: And maybe I was mistaken. I'm reading over the order, and maybe it is, I think it is for FY26 unless I'm-

▶ 1:30:03 Speaker 2: It is. It is. No, you're all good.

▶ 1:30:04 Ryan Williams: So it's not FY27. Mm-mm. It's just for this upcoming fiscal year. Yes. Yeah. You're totally good. I just was trying to, for the good of the council, to note that we're voting on a $500,000 annual cap. But we will vote later- Yes ... to increase it. So- Correct. Thank you ... but I wanted to ask you- Yes ... yeah, I wanted to ask you two questions. The first is, so the cap is a cap on how many expenses we can pay, but there's often more money than that in the fund. So how much money is in this fund currently?

▶ 1:30:30 Speaker 6: In our recreation revolving fund? Yeah. There's probably about around two hun... It's hard to nail down because it's very fluid. Yeah. But I would say there's about $250,000. However, a lot of expenses still, we're still paying out all of our spring expenses. Yeah. And it's tricky because it's not fully reflective because of where, if anybody's signed up for a summer program or a fall program, all that revenue is coming in to the rec revolving fund now, but the expenses for some of those won't get paid until next fiscal year. Mm-hmm. And so it's this-... continuous season brochure comes out. Yeah, revolving, comes out and it gets filled up. And so the revenue is there. So basically, when you see this number increasing, like we're coming for an increase in the rec revolving expense number, it's because we're offering more programs and collecting also more revenue, that there's now more expenses. So it's not just this skyrocketing expense that we're not prepared to cover, it's just making sure we have permission to cover.

▶ 1:31:42 Speaker 2: Sure. Sure. So I want to ask you if we think that

▶ 1:31:47 Ryan Williams: we need to increase to 575 for the rest of fiscal year '26, do we also think that we should have a higher cap generally speaking? Because this order would cover it for about three weeks. Mm-hmm. And then next year will start, and the cap will go back down to 500,000, which is what it is in the budget for '27.

▶ 1:32:03 Speaker 6: I don't know if I'm authorized to say. I can only give my two cents. It's always higher, right? It's always better, in my opinion, to have a higher amount, like having it... But if it ends up being 500,000 and we have to come back next fiscal year, that's okay. It'll also depend on the $83,000 now coming out of the general fund rather than the rec revolving fund. So it's kind of tricky for me to say exactly what it will end up being. Sure. The 500 might cover it. It might be a 525. It might be a 550. Okay. But again, it really comes down to how things go. We're in the neighborhood. Yeah. We're in the neighborhood. All good.

▶ 1:32:39 Speaker 2: Best way to say it. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Councilor Finocchiaro.

▶ 1:32:43 Speaker 6: Oh, did I put my hand up?

▶ 1:32:44 Speaker 2: You didn't. You're more than welcome to withdraw, though.

▶ 1:32:46 Speaker 6: That's okay. I'll just make a motion to move to the bottom line.

▶ 1:32:50 Devin Romanul: Second. Motion to move the bottom line made by Councilor Finocchiaro, seconded by-

▶ 1:32:53 Speaker 6: Point of order. Is this motion to recommend?

▶ 1:32:54 Devin Romanul: Oh, that's right. It's a motion to approve. My apologies.

▶ 1:32:56 Speaker 6: Sorry, motion to approve. Second.

▶ 1:32:58 Devin Romanul: Motion to approve made by Councilor Finocchiaro, seconded by Councilor Park. On discussion? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll.

▶ 1:33:05 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen. Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro. Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine. Yes. Councilor Karamcheti. Yes. Councilor Kowal. Yes. Councilor Park. Yes. Councilor Williams. Yes. President Freeman. Yes. Chair Romanul. Yes. All in favor.

▶ 1:33:21 Devin Romanul: All right, that item is approved, and we'll move forward. Thank you. I think we'll see you a little bit later in the evening. We're going to move on to the... My apologies, I should say, we have to do all the departmental budgets and then separate out the orders in free cash appropriations.

▶ 1:33:39 Speaker 6: Sounds good. We,

▶ 1:33:41 Devin Romanul: legally speaking, have to do one chunk of items and then the other chunk- Makes sense ... so my apologies for the back and forth.

▶ 1:33:46 Speaker 6: And thank you to everybody. This is wonderful news for our department, so appreciate it. Thank you.

▶ 1:33:52 Devin Romanul: Great. Thank you for all you do. Up next, we have 2669, Park Permits Revolving Account. It was gluten.

▶ 1:34:00 Speaker 7: That's mine. Did it have gluten in it?

▶ 1:34:02 Devin Romanul: Joining us this evening, Superintendent Carrillo. Thanks so much for joining us.

▶ 1:34:07 Speaker 6: Thank you. So touching on the revolving fund, so we don't have a traditional budget. We have our revolving fund, as well as several shared line items with the DPW Parks and Forestry. One of those which was the playground and equipment that was raised when the override passed to 20,000, which has helped us substantially, as well as the Adopt a Site line item. So those are part of DPW's budget, but the Parks Department is able to advise on how that money is spent to help out the facilities that we oversee. So our permit revolving fund is essentially income from any field or outdoor facility rentals that we do year to year. The two years that I've been in this role, it's been pretty stable, between 15 to 20,000. Right now, the amount is a little under 16,000, and the majority of it is from field rentals. But if anyone has any questions on that, I'm happy to field them.

▶ 1:35:10 Speaker 2: Councilor Karamcheti.

▶ 1:35:12 Manjula Karamcheti: Thank you so much for being here. Really appreciate your time. I have one question. How does the Adopt a Site work? I know we've been actually going back and forth about it- Yeah ... and I'm still confused. So if it's okay, if you could just explain it, I would really appreciate it.

▶ 1:35:31 Speaker 6: So it's a volunteer system. There's a lot of them. So what we're currently doing, we're working with the city solicitor on upgrading the guidelines for it and the application process. We actually had a senior tax write-off worker that created a interactive map showing all the locations. It has certain color codes for if they're open, if they're rented, which are covered by DPW. So what we're trying to do is kind of revamp that and put it out to the public. So if someone wants to sign up, they could essentially go on the city website under Parks, fill out a form, look at the map, which ones are open. The difficult thing for it is managing who's overseeing them because there's so many, and the thing we're running into right now is people that have had them for so many years that either if it was an organization, and if it was a volunteer organization and people have moved on, they're kind of getting left behind. So we're actively working to try to update that, and the plan is, in the near future, once we get the application and the guidelines for it back from the city solicitor, we're going to hard launch on the website. We'll probably do some type of campaign through the city, through the mayor's office, and yeah.

▶ 1:36:44 Manjula Karamcheti: So to clarify, we're revamping the system. It's not completed yet. In the meantime, if we've identified two organizations interested in adopting a site, what is their best course of action?

▶ 1:37:00 Speaker 6: I would say email myself or Cindy Berkeley, and- ... we can evaluate it and kind of see what's open. Like I said, we have the $5,000 in the DPW budget for new signs, replacements, upgrades. We do have an extensive list of signs that are... due for an upgrade. So we're evaluating that over the next week before the fiscal year closes to take care of that. So if anyone is interested, I would say email the parks department and

▶ 1:37:32 Manjula Karamcheti: yeah. And thank you for your efforts in updating it and bringing it live and into the present. Really appreciate that. My other question, super excited about some of the appropriations to work on playgrounds and parks. Just do you have a sense, or what is the best way to find out the timeline of when things are starting and when they'll be completed?

▶ 1:37:55 Speaker 6: So I'm working with Tom Dalton in the mayor's office, and we're going to hopefully put signage up to discuss the timelines for these. Right now, we are going through contracts, and there's things out at bid. So once things are finalized, we'll have a more firm timeframe for them.

▶ 1:38:14 Speaker 5: Perfect. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it.

▶ 1:38:17 Devin Romanul: Up next, I have Vice Chair Vandiver.

▶ 1:38:19 Kimberly Vandiver: Thank you. Actually, great minds think alike. I also had a question about the Adopt-A-Site program. I had a resident who is interested and has informally been maintaining an area. And I guess the one question is, as you said, it seems some of these sites have not been actively managed over time, and it seems roughly speaking from what I can tell, maybe half of them are very actively maintained. So is that what you were speaking about doing a campaign to get more active participation in the program?

▶ 1:38:54 Speaker 6: Potentially. Like I said, we're trying to communicate as best we can with all the adoptees we have. I believe there's over 80 of them throughout the city, so for a two-person department, it is definitely difficult to manage, especially with all the other facilities we do have. But we're continuing to do it. We typically send out an annual letter and a survey, and with that survey, we ask, "Are you looking to come back for the next year? Are there anything you're noticing there?" On top of visits we're able to do as a department to visit them. But as we continue to update what we're going to do with the website, I think we'll be able to make it easier to streamline, and I think get the word out for it. And maybe people that have had them and haven't been as active might take that as a pick-me-up to continue to update.

▶ 1:39:49 Kimberly Vandiver: Yeah, I'm excited to hear about the website improvements around that. The other question I had was the particular person I was working with was interested in, they're older, and they wanted to have mulch dropped off if possible at the site. And my understanding from the DPW director is that the general practice is there's mulch available in a location of the city, but you need to come and get it yourself with a truck and bring it back to your site. So I wonder if that's something that could get into the budget or even, I don't know if this person would've been interested, but even if it was a paid service that you could drop off mulch, I think that might open it up to more people. And I'd also love to see if you had time to work on it, that if you could do some sort of partnership with a garden center or something to say, "Here's some discounted plants you could get," or anything to really make it as easy as possible for people who want to maintain it to have the ability to do it.

▶ 1:40:47 Speaker 6: Definitely. And the one thing we do offer as the city is the free mulch pickup day. So I believe it was at the high school parking lot last month. So it's every May. As the weather starts to shape up, we do a free mulch pickup, and we'll have a DPW staff member there to help load buckets, trucks, whatever it may be. But I can continue to look into that if there's residents or adoptees that need assistance with mulch. I think the best practice, like similar, like I said, people interested to contact the parks department, and we can try to help them out as much as we can.

▶ 1:41:22 Speaker 8: Thank you. Thanks very much.

▶ 1:41:23 Devin Romanul: All right. Up next, I have Councilor Williams. Thank you.

▶ 1:41:29 Ryan Williams: I was just thinking about how we're all asking about all these different things, but we're actually voting on the park permits revolving account, right?

▶ 1:41:34 Speaker 6: Sorry.

▶ 1:41:35 Ryan Williams: $40,000. No, it got me thinking really well because I was like, "Why don't we have a parks budget? Why doesn't the parks department have a budget?" It does have a budget. It's in the public works department. Mm. And it's, I think, another indication of some of the things we've been talking about around this horseshoe, where we really want to start seeing more now that we have growing budgets and

▶ 1:41:58 Speaker 6: capital outlays and all this stuff.

▶ 1:41:59 Speaker 2: We want to see them contained

▶ 1:42:01 Ryan Williams: within the departments that we're voting on. So 475 is the parks and forestry budget.

▶ 1:42:07 Speaker 2: And what I wanted to ask is how much of this budget do you personally

▶ 1:42:11 Speaker 6: dictate or control or oversee? So the one thing I forgot to mention is all the capital improvement projects that come out. So, like a new playground- Yeah ... the fence replacement, like we did the dog park. Those things are under 475- Mm ... but controlled by the parks department. The two line items that I co-directly oversee are the parks, playgrounds, and repairs. Mm-hmm. And then the Adopt-A-Site. So those are the only two that-

▶ 1:42:40 Speaker 2: The playground repair and the Adopt-A-Site? Yes. Yeah. Okay. Who do you co-manage them with?

▶ 1:42:48 Ryan Williams: The managers at DPW, so Elena- Oh, I see. Okay ... Masponari. I appreciate that. It's not super germane to the conversation. It made me think, and I wanted to make sure that I understood clearly. So thank you. I'll make a motion to approve 2669, the parks permits revolving account.

▶ 1:43:05 Devin Romanul: Second. Motion approved made by Councilor Williams, seconded by Councilor Pinocchio. On discussion, I have President Freeman.

▶ 1:43:11 Bradley Freeman: Thank you very much. And since Councilor Williams generously opened this door, I do have a question about the interplay with DPW. Mr. Carli, in an ideal world-How would the parks department best be set up to manage the city's fields in the best possible way, particularly in the busy season of spring and fall, trying to prep the fields? What would make your life as superintendent of parks easiest in terms of navigating DPW workers and ensuring that the fields are prepped in the time allowed, recognizing that weather conditions are the preeminent factor here, and there's often a reason the fields can't be open until a certain date? But what could help make that process more efficient?

▶ 1:44:00 Speaker 6: It's a tough one to answer. Our green team is not 100 people, right? It's six to eight people on a good day overseeing basically all the open space in the city. I think the bottleneck we run into is user groups in the spring, with rain on a regular basis, getting fields ready, and then similar in the fall. I don't know. One thing that I think could improve it would be the initial work going into the spring. And again, that's some of the stuff we're doing right now with the supplemental budget, is remediating that, improving the grading of fields so it's level to help, so when it does rain, we're not getting puddles, and it doesn't run off. And I know we're improving the stormwater at the Knoll, and we're improving the irrigation there. So, I think getting them ready so the green team can just maintain them, I think would help.

▶ 1:45:06 Bradley Freeman: Great. And I think one thing we've talked about, and I know there's talk of having a conversation this summer with the user groups about how they can best support these efforts as well- Yeah ... and devising a plan where they can be more proactive in helping get these fields ready, knowing how much use they put on the fields and their desire to contribute to that as well. So thank you for all you do. Yeah.

▶ 1:45:28 Devin Romanul: Terrific. I do have another question from Councilor Williams.

▶ 1:45:32 Ryan Williams: Yeah. I'm on discussion for my own motion, right? It's like, the green team, is this just grass guys and- Parks and forestry ... and trees? Okay.

▶ 1:45:42 Speaker 6: So

▶ 1:45:43 Speaker 2: that's-

▶ 1:45:44 Speaker 6: What's the split you think of? Or do they sort of do it all? Depends on the day. Oh, okay. So you could call the... They could just do it all.

▶ 1:45:50 Speaker 2: They're just a mix and match. Got it. Okay. Thank you.

▶ 1:45:52 Devin Romanul: All right. Seeing no other questions, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 1:45:56 Speaker 6: Yes. Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kohl? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. Chair Romanul? Yes. All in favor.

▶ 1:46:12 Devin Romanul: All right. We will approve 2669. Up next, Department 653, Mount Hood Enterprise Fund 6200.

▶ 1:46:20 Speaker 6: Thank you. So the enterprise fund oversees basically all of the enterprise that is Mount Hood. That includes capital improvement projects, contracting, the professional service, and paying Sagamore Management, the bonds we have that include Pine Banks, the playing fields at the high school, and the equipment that we purchased for Mount Hood when Sagamore took over the contract. The relationship with Sagamore has been great. I have, I guess, a biased opinion because they're the only ones I've worked with. But hearing stories of what happened before and seeing the financials and what they're able to bring and provide for the city financially, it's really good to see. And like I said, working with them on a regular basis, the communication's great. They're keeping the course immaculate. It's busy day after day. So all of the things that are going to be coming from appropriations are a result of Sagamore basically making more money than the year before. So asking for more money in professional services is to pay them to uphold the contract. Because they made more money, we have to pay them more money. The current split is the city gets 35% of the golf revenue, 8% of any food, beverage, or simulator rentals, and 0% of the pro shop. I can open up to any questions.

▶ 1:47:48 Speaker 2: Any questions from my colleagues? Seeing none, what is the will of the committee?

▶ 1:47:56 Devin Romanul: Motion to approve. Motion to approve made by President Freeman. Second. Seconded by Councilor Kohl.

▶ 1:48:03 Speaker 2: On discussion? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 1:48:08 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kohl? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. Chair Romanul? Yes. All in favor.

▶ 1:48:25 Devin Romanul: All right. Thank you so much. We'll approve 653. Thank you. We'll be back with you in just a few moments- Thank you ... after one agenda item for our other appropriations. Our last departmental budget for FY27 on this evening's agenda is Pine Banks, Department 652.

▶ 1:48:47 Devin Romanul: Joining us this evening is Mr. Hank Kaiser, the president of the Pine Banks board.

▶ 1:48:55 Devin Romanul: And if memory recalls, one of the better joke tellers of the-

▶ 1:48:58 Speaker 7: Excellent Sorry

▶ 1:49:00 Speaker 2: ... budgetary testifiers.

▶ 1:49:07 Devin Romanul: No pressure. Not to put any pressure on you.

▶ 1:49:09 Speaker 7: I think I see that everybody got one of these.

▶ 1:49:19 Speaker 7: And I think we've got some new faces here as well Pine Banks is sort of an odd duck. It was created by Elijah Converse, a mayor of Malden. When he died, he had this extra land, so he had the legislature before he died. They had the idea of creating a private corporation that was authorized to receive funds from the cities of Malden and Melrose. And they came up with a formula for figuring out the minimum amount that disbursement should be. And the first page one through four of this report shows the factors involved in that funding. And it's summarized on page four, and basically it's the percentage of the lower valuation for the less valuable city, which would be Melrose. But it's $7.8 billion. That's pretty good. There's a percentage there projected, so there's 1% of the total and then 1/150 of that. So each city would have a bill of 525. You add them together, and now we're over a million dollars, which is very comforting. If you look back 40 years on this, we were lucky to break 100,000. But

▶ 1:51:09 Speaker 7: the real guts of the operation is on page five, and this is a budget summary that we put together 20 years ago. And the purpose of that is to keep consistent so that you can look at it and have a feeling of what is happening there between the two cities because it looks familiar. We have part one income, which is marked there with a red symbol one, and that's salaries and compensation for the staff. And we've operated now with, since 2012, we rent employees from the city of Melrose, which means that all our employees are Melrose employees because you got a good operation up there, and Pauline knows what she's doing. Mm-hmm. And what happens is that the city of Malden kicks in quarterly their share of that. And if you look at page six, line 47, it's 59,791. That's how much Malden kicks in, and that's an increase of 2.66% per year.

▶ 1:52:29 Speaker 7: Before that, the employees were receiving checks from one city one week and another city the next week. And we had someone who got hurt on the job, and the question was, "Well, who is paying the check?" when we went to look at workman's comp. That didn't make much sense. So we decided to go on this basis, and then since 2012, it's worked really well. The two cities talk to each other, which is the most important thing.

▶ 1:52:59 Speaker 7: Section 2 starts with line item four and goes through 42, and that's the operations of the park. And it's also recapped down in the lower right in that red box, and that's Melrose's share of the operational cost for the park. Its total is 128,765. That's there so that the controller can figure out how much are we talking about for this park, and it's equal for each city. That amount has gone down 6.81%, or $9,400 this year. This particular year, we've been trying to keep the cost down because we've got two cities. No one's really making a lot of money these days. But the city of Malden's got a very difficult problem with the failure of their override- Mm-hmm ... and the termination of a lot of staff. So we're trying to keep it as minimal as possible. The third category of expenditures from line 43 through 58 is equipment purchases, which are one-time situations, and long-term financing, which is sort of like the home mortgage. And on line 45 is a 10-year loan that we got in 2016, and that was for the resurface of the rugby field and the building out of the new shed on the property. That matures in February of '27. So the good news there is you can see on line 45 a reduction in the cost of $50,000. That's because the mortgage is paid off. That was a mass development bond that we got through East Boston Savings Bank, and it was a good source of long-term fixed financing, but it was a little bit cumbersome, and it had an overhead on itThe second item on is 46. There's a foundation in Malden, of which I am the president, called the Adelaide Breed Baird Foundation, and that is borrowing $800,000 to finish off the project in 2016 and finish off the utility shed. That came to 1.6 million, that utility shed. But it's changed the operations to the better greatly. Mm. And then line 47 is a line of credit that the Baird Foundation advanced in 2024. It was a total of $1,250,000 for a series of improvements, which included resurfacing the track and resurfacing the baseball field, which was originally 2007. The fields have about a 15, 16-year useful life. But, the foundation basically said, "Why are we lending money to the federal government at a fixed rate for 10 years? We can lend it to Melrose. They're just as reasonable." And I think that's another source of long-term capital financing that we could use in the future. And they seem pleased to do that. And it's cheaper than doing a bond, and less complicated for the treasurer.

▶ 1:57:07 Speaker 7: So, let me see. Line 52 is an indication of the change in equipment purchases from last year. Line 52 was a snowplow that does sidewalks, and that keeps Forest Dale to Wyoming sidewalks clean, and it's worked out pretty well. 53 is buying a new lawnmower, which is about 15 years being replaced. And 54 is a tow-along thing, which blows pine needles and leaves off the track. And it clears the track without sweeping it, which reduces your surface wear. Mm-hmm. Pictures on the new pieces of equipment are on page 21.

▶ 1:58:03 Speaker 7: That's not me with the hard hat on. But,

▶ 1:58:10 Speaker 7: they do a very good job on the fields.

▶ 1:58:15 Speaker 7: So, that's type one income, two income, and three. The summary is on 59. And in total, it shows a reduction from last year of $15,000. And the total budget for the year is 1,194,912.60, which is a reduction, again, of $15,000. Now, the problem with working with this budget is

▶ 1:58:50 Speaker 7: that's the amount we're spending, but it's divided equally between the two cities. So, the question is, are you talking about Melrose's share, or Malden's share, or the total gross? And that's where these columns on the right show the dollar increase of an item, percentage increase of an item, the amount being expended per city, and the dollar amount increase or decrease per city. And again, the red box is to help Carrie Ann figure out what's due every month.

▶ 1:59:30 Speaker 7: So, that's where the budget is. And I appreciate your consideration. I hope it's clear. Carrie did a memo and circulated it, trying to reconcile the Munis numbers with what you see here in the annual report. That's beyond me, honestly. But I think what's happening is her staffing numbers are showing gross figures, but not necessarily the money coming in from Malden to make it an equal share. And the point is that it is equal between the two towns, except that we rely more on HR here because I think you've got a better operation. Don't tell the mayor.

▶ 2:00:22 Speaker 7: Any questions on that so far?

▶ 2:00:26 Devin Romanul: Just to note to our colleagues, that this is recorded, for people in any of the cities that happen to be listening. Up first, I have Councilor Forgiero.

▶ 2:00:34 Cal Finocchiaro: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Keezer, for coming before us every year, and I really appreciate your thorough explanation of the budget because it's overwhelming when you first look at it, but when you kind of piece it apart, it helps. And I just wanted to say, more than a comment versus a question, I spend a lot of time at Pine Banks, and I just want to commend the group over there that takes care of the fields. I spend a lot of time in the track, and that field in between the track and just the grounds are just really well maintained. So, I think every penny we spend over there is well spent. Thanks.

▶ 2:01:13 Ryan Williams: Terrific. Next up, Councilor Williams. Thank you. I wanted to equally echo thanking you for always walking us in painful detail through the budget. I always appreciate it every year. I wanted to, in particular, ask if you had any thoughts on what seems to be a very dramatic reduction in utility costs

▶ 2:01:34 Speaker 7: Well, before the new shed, the new utility building, we really didn't have any utility sheds or utility costs because we didn't have any indoor space in the winter, so it was sort of primitive. When we got the new building, which is heated and cooled with electricity and natural gas, we weren't really sure what the number was going to be. So what you saw was an estimate, and then experience told us that we're not spending that much. Hmm. The old shed, which is up over the bungalow on 1087 Main Street in Malden, had an oil burner. Hmm. And we're not really using that. That was the only place for warmth during the winter, and it wasn't a very good building as it was. But we're not using that, which is why the fuel oil is down. Hmm. But that's matching experience with what our new situation looks like.

▶ 2:02:40 Speaker 2: Understood. Yeah.

▶ 2:02:43 Ryan Williams: In the report, you mentioned the-- We've talked about this before, the area with high lead contamination. Is there any thinking around what might become of that space other than just fencing it off? Have you explored remediation costs at all?

▶ 2:02:56 Speaker 7: Well, our experience with that, with the same engineers, is the experience with Roosevelt Park down in Malden. Hmm. Which is an issue that is measured in millions. Okay. Understood. It's a question of pulling out all the dirt in the area and replacing it with new dirt. We've been 20 years doing a rear guard action to avoid the issues of remediation on that. And the thing is that Melrose used Pine Banks until 1958 as its municipal dump. I can remember my father bringing me down there. But it's lead. I don't think the danger of that, from what the engineers are telling me, is any greater than the land around an old Victorian which is bleeding lead paint into the soil. But it is currently, the temporary fence is costing $16,000 a year, and I think it would be some method of covering, finding a... The dog park is a good example because it's covered. Hmm. The Sylvan Street parking lot, as you notice, isn't really asphalt. It's sort of a compact material. And that's there to minimize the remediation cost. Mm-hmm. Also, there's differential settlement, as you may have noticed in the parking lot. Mm-hmm. Just because of what's underneath is, it's old bottles and pieces of buildings and such as that. But that's something that we are considering. Okay. It might be perfectly covered with a pickleball court.

▶ 2:04:44 Speaker 2: That's exactly what I was going to say.

▶ 2:04:47 Ryan Williams: You read my mind. I wanted to really commend the organization on the report of the superintendent, which is remarkably detailed and so helpful and thoughtful. We're having lots of discussions around fields in Melrose, and I looked at this, and so many of the things that I never thought I would see here are here. So it's a great example to point to and learn more about field management from your superintendent, who has-

▶ 2:05:18 Speaker 7: Counted the numbers

▶ 2:05:19 Ryan Williams: ... 25 years in the grass industry. So it's fantastic to see that. How many people are on the team, or do you use contractors in terms of managing those fields?

▶ 2:05:31 Speaker 7: Well, he outsources specific tasks to the degree that it's required. Trying to in-house things because outsourcing costs a little bit more. We've got three

▶ 2:05:47 Speaker 7: staff members. One of our staff members is more of a mechanic so that he can fix lawnmowers, and we've got a lift in the garage there, which is very helpful. The building has been transformational because it allows so many things to be done. It's an air-conditioned space, for instance. When it gets to be 100 degrees outside, they can go get a glass of water. But as you could see in this book, we brought Santa's workshop into the shed. Mm-hmm. And

▶ 2:06:27 Speaker 7: the number 12 was the Ferry House Festival. Mm-hmm. I had no idea. That was my ward counselor in Malden. Mm-hmm. And she's now the police commissioner, so kind of hard to figure.

▶ 2:06:45 Ryan Williams: I have one more question for you, which is I know that you have tried to do some traffic calming with the speed humps on the road, and there are still signs up that say, "Watch out, speed hump," but the speed humps aren't there. I personally think that the ones that were chosen were a little aggressive for the purpose. I prefer these sort of round, gentle slopes. Mm-hmm. But not to put my finger on that scale. My real question is just, are you considering restoring some of those traffic calming features, or were they just sort of unpopular and you don't want to try them again?

▶ 2:07:20 Speaker 7: No, the problem with those is the snow removal.

▶ 2:07:25 Ryan Williams: Yes. Well, they were temporary, the ones that were there.

▶ 2:07:27 Speaker 7: Yeah, and I'm pretty sure that I've gone over a couple of the temporary ones recently, so I think they're back, aren't

▶ 2:07:35 Ryan Williams: they? Not the ones-- Well, not the ones when you come in off by Hunts and then go around to the track. That's where I go. I haven't seen them yet. But anyway, I just wanted to ask if you guys had any thoughts or any future thoughts to adding accessible pathways from-

▶ 2:07:50 Speaker 7: The superintendent. Yeah. He likes them. Yeah. And I think we've got them on Sylvan Street. Okay. Although they may have become loosened from their tie-downs.

▶ 2:08:00 Jason Chen: Okay. Thank you. All right, up next, I have Councilor Chen. Thank you, Chair, and thank you, Mr. Keezer. We had a conversation today, and I did not know much about this, but I agree, this is an amazing operational report. My overall takeaway is this is a really difficult setup to run because you've got two cities, and then within them you have a number of stakeholders. So he was telling us about how he schedules between two different school districts, a number of leagues, a number of private leagues, and how to balance all those fights. And left to their own devices, it does not go well. So there's a referee who has to have a huge amount of patience and practicality, and also a good sense of humor to keep this all going. And they essentially run their own public works department separate from ours, with their own equipment and capital equipment. So-

▶ 2:08:51 Speaker 7: Can I address the scheduling? Yes. On page seven, it's a listing of liaisons, and one of them is Rob. So all the difficult work is delegated to him. Thank you very much. No worries. The point of that is Rob's from Melrose, and Steve Fogarty's from Melrose too, the AD. So Rob's got seniority over Steve Fogarty, the AD, which is just to keep Steve down a little bit. Right. Yes. And Julie Turner and Charlie Confrey are the same from Malden. And the point of it is that the liaisons are supposed to be talking to all the soccer coaches so they don't come in and beat up the superintendent. They beat... But it's also true that Rob can do his own scheduling, go into the website and put in engagements, and so can Steve. Mm-hmm. And we're going to be having a liaisons meeting, I think, later this month, and basically it's the two cities get together and talk about what's important. And Melrose is going to be able to put its own scholastic end user groups in, and then there'll be a period of time after that when other groups can come in and look at getting space and ball time. And so it's really working, which is an interesting approach. Thank you, Rob.

▶ 2:10:34 Devin Romanul: Well, with that, I feel like you're underutilized. Maybe you should be fixing national healthcare or- ... solving the Middle East peace or something. But I propose we move this to the bottom line. Second. Second. Motion to move to the bottom line made by Councilor Chen, seconded by Councilor Karamcheti. All right. It was very close. On discussion, up first I have Vice Chair Vanderberg.

▶ 2:10:55 Kimberly Vandiver: Thank you. I was wondering if you could tell us about user fees that you receive for any of the groups that use the space or how that works.

▶ 2:11:05 Speaker 7: The City of Melrose scholastic end user groups don't pay. If we've got anybody that Rob puts onto the schedule isn't charged. Occasionally we'll get a league of baseball players, and they'll pay us for the field use and the light use, and that money ends up going to buy us grass seed and such.

▶ 2:11:32 Kimberly Vandiver: Okay. And also the picnic rental, the picnic sites and pavilions, is that also the same situation?

▶ 2:11:39 Speaker 7: Yes. Yeah. And that seems to work pretty well, except that we, believe it or not, had a truck bump into one of our picnic sheds, and so now we have to get that fixed. I never thought we'd have a truck knocking down our picnic site, but...

▶ 2:11:57 Speaker 8: Yeah.

▶ 2:12:00 Kimberly Vandiver: Very surprising. I'm glad you're working on it, though. I've seen all the caution tape up and everything like that.

▶ 2:12:06 Speaker 7: We have a preschool up there. Does everyone know that?

▶ 2:12:09 Kimberly Vandiver: She knows that. That was going to be my last point, is my daughter really enjoys the preschool, and I'm so excited that you all are expanding their program next year to additional headcount. And next year I'll have two kids in the program. So everyone talks a lot about the pond and the fields, which also get a lot of utilization, but the fact that you have preschool kids running around in that area is wonderful as well.

▶ 2:12:34 Speaker 7: I think it's amazing to me that they're there in January. Mm-hmm. But it seems to thrive. It's a good group of people.

▶ 2:12:42 Kimberly Vandiver: Yeah, it's wonderful. The teachers are wonderful. They keep the kids happy in all sorts of weather, and they have their tricks for what to wear and how to stay warm and how to stay happy, and it seems to work.

▶ 2:12:54 Speaker 7: I think we gave them a grant from the Baird Foundation to help with their membership and the kids coming in. And there's a storage shed up there now, so they can keep things safe.

▶ 2:13:08 Kimberly Vandiver: Yeah. Really appreciate that you've expanded, that that's one of the recent additions to the park. Thank you.

▶ 2:13:15 Devin Romanul: Perfect, and I believe I have last in queue right now, Councilor Karamcheti.

▶ 2:13:19 Speaker 5: I am no longer needed in the queue. All right. I second the motion to move to the bottom line.

▶ 2:13:23 Devin Romanul: All right. All right. Absent any other questions from councilors, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 2:13:29 Speaker 6: Vice Chair Vanderberg? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Cal? Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. Chair Romanul? Yes. All in favor.

▶ 2:13:46 Devin Romanul: All right. We'll move the bottom line on 652. Thank you, Mr. Keezer. And I'll mention I appreciate-... uh, having Pine Banks in Ward 7. I'm very, uh, very appreciative of having that jewel of the neighborhood. Um, yes, uh-

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