Acceptance of the FY2025 Emergency Management Performance Grant in the amount of $5,850.00

Transcript (~15 min @ 58:42)

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▶ 58:40 Devin Romanul: Resuming our Appropriations and Oversight Committee, first item on our agenda is grant ID number 2026-1529, acceptance of the FY 2025 Emergency Management Performance Grant in the amount of $5,850. I believe Chief White is ready to join us. Hey, Chief.

▶ 59:02 Devin Romanul: I wouldn't mind grabbing a chair while-

▶ 59:06 Devin Romanul: He's putting out metaphorical fires, as it were.

▶ 59:12 Speaker 7: Thank you for the courtesy laugh.

▶ 59:16 Speaker 3: Good evening. How you doing?

▶ 59:18 Speaker 2: Good evening. Well, thank you. The committee had to respectfully request that the council accept a grant that Emergency Management Department received, Emergency Management Performance Grant, for a total of $5,358. And that's to help efforts to strengthen local emergency management preparedness, response, and recovery. And I'll be using it to buy a laptop, a couple of workstations, and a membership in the Mystic Region Emergency Management training group we're in. So, it'll be the Emergency Management Center in case of some type of incident. We have to bring everybody together to coordinate services to help out the citizens. That's it, if you have any questions.

▶ 1:00:09 Devin Romanul: Wonderful. Up first, I have Councilor Kowal.

▶ 1:00:12 Elizabeth Kowal: Thank you, Chief White. I think, and we were just briefly starting to talk about this, but I did speak about this with the mayor, is one of the concerns that I have about, not what you're asking, I understand what you're asking for, but it does fall under a federal grant. And under the terms of the federal grant, which I read today, it talks about, as we are aware, all of the new sort of onerous ordinances and the regulations that have gone into place, including sanctuary cities, including all sorts of rules and laws around immigration, including not having DEI programs and things like that. So, my concern is certainly not about what you're looking for, but my concern is sort of where this comes in, which is under this federal money, which has all of these restrictions on it, and could, if the government so chose, put us in some trouble if they started asking questions about what we wanted to do because we were taking this money. And so, as I was thinking about this tonight, and I certainly am appreciative of, as I said three times now, what you're trying to do, I would like further information from the state about how we should be proceeding with these guidelines now in place. Not to say that you won't get it, not to say that the state won't say, "Go ahead, do it." But I think there have been other instances where we've had this sort of collision between these new guidelines from the federal government and us using federal money, where we have looked for guidance from the AG's office. And I think I would be more comfortable, even though this is a small amount of money, I don't think that that is ultimately what matters. I think that I would be more comfortable getting guidance from the AG's office as to whether or not we should proceed under this grant if we have these concerns, and whether or not we could find the money elsewhere. So that is just not a question for you, and I know that you have experience in DE&I and hiring and all of that, and you do a terrific job. So this is certainly not about you or anything that you're asking of your department. It's just about where this money is coming from creates sort of an umbrella of questions for me. Right. We are a sub-recipient. It does come from the federal government, yes. So there are the guidelines in the contract that, we agree to how we use this money, and how we spend it, we'd have to follow the guidelines as set forth. Right.

▶ 1:02:43 Speaker 2: And I think I've done that with the stuff that I've requested, but I don't know if just by signing, it doesn't trap us- Right ... for any further funding. I'm not sure. For any past funding we got.

▶ 1:02:58 Devin Romanul: Any other councilors? Councilor Chen.

▶ 1:03:02 Jason Chen: Thank you. Chief, I remember during the budget cycle, we talked about this being an important part of the program that you wanted to build out. Mm-hmm. That said, we were spending money on IT and computers and a membership. Right. I'm okay taking outside state federal money to come back to Melrose to do things, but do we need those computers or could it be spent elsewhere if we already have computers that could manage our emergency response or emergency management group?

▶ 1:03:37 Speaker 2: I'm looking at this more like having two hats as being a fire chief and emergency management. I'm looking maybe further down the road if emergency management is a separate person, as it was before I took it. So that, the emergency management stuff wouldn't be on my fire department computer. I'm just trying to separate both of them so that when I pass it along to whoever follows me, it'll be an easy separation. I guess I'm not an IT person, but that was my thinking, to have its own separate laptop to wherever emergency management ends up. And I'm trying to build a room with videos, but as technology gets further and further, I'm not sure if we'll even have to be all together in the same room. We might be able to actually do a video conference from all our offices or whatever. I don't know how that would actually occur, but I can sort of foresee that in the future. So I'm just trying to at least have a place where we could at least meet together to work out whatever situation is going on.

▶ 1:04:40 Jason Chen: So it sounds like you want computers to be generic and universal and accessible for anyone to use, regardless of their password or what permissions or login.

▶ 1:04:50 Speaker 2: No, it would be whoever the emergency management director is. We have this one, and then all that communication and plans and training would just stay with that one. Okay. So you can easily access for whoever follows me. Because if I had to call IT plenty of times to find out emergency management's records and stuff like that to get access to it. They are all on the city server, but I just have trouble getting to them.

▶ 1:05:17 Speaker 7: Okay. Yeah.

▶ 1:05:18 Jason Chen: In hearing you describe the problem, I'm wondering if there's an IT solution that our IT team can help you find that-- I'm fine if we buy computers with this, but it still helps you solve that kind of access problem.

▶ 1:05:31 Speaker 2: Right. It would with passwords and things like that. Yep. That was just my thinking when I applied for this.

▶ 1:05:35 Jason Chen: Okay. Then through the chair, I hear what Councilor Kowal is saying. I'm kind of on the other side of this where, yes, I don't agree with how the federal government is putting strings, but I feel like Melrosians and Massachusetts people pay a lot of federal taxes, and to have it be cut at $3.7 billion and for us to not be getting or to have emergency services funding from the federal government get cut by about $400 million as punishment for I don't know what, I don't think we need to protest extra by resisting funding that I feel like we should have been getting all along, and these extra strings attached are-- I don't agree with them, but I don't feel like we should deny the chief or kind of Melrose residents any outside funding because of it. But I totally hear the principle that you're

▶ 1:06:29 Speaker 3: expressing.

▶ 1:06:35 Devin Romanul: Thank you so much. Up next, I have Vice Chair Vandiver.

▶ 1:06:38 Kimberly Vandiver: Thank you. So the other risk I see with grant-- So first of all, thank you for being with us tonight and for putting forward the grant to buy these items. Along the same lines of risk of accepting grants right now, so one potential risk is strings that may come with those grants. The other one I believe we've run into in Melrose is repayment, or payment of the grants, where we have, I believe, grants that we've been approved for, but then the money has not yet come through after quite a while. And so my question is, what would the order of operations be here? Would you buy the items and then wait for reimbursement, or would we wait for the money to come through and then buy the items?

▶ 1:07:21 Speaker 2: Exactly. The first one. We buy it, and then we put in for reimbursement for these items.

▶ 1:07:25 Kimberly Vandiver: Okay. So I don't know how likely that is to have an issue, but that would be the one other thing I think we could watch out for is, are we getting reimbursed once we've spent that money? Thank you.

▶ 1:07:37 Devin Romanul: Perfect. Up next, I have Councilor Kowal.

▶ 1:07:41 Elizabeth Kowal: I was just following up on what I said earlier, and I'm going to put forward a motion to hold this for now until we can get further guidance from the AG's office about what the consequences could be of this and what their recommendation is.

▶ 1:07:57 Speaker 7: Motion to hold made by Councilor Kowal.

▶ 1:08:00 Speaker 2: I'm going to second, but I do also have a question.

▶ 1:08:02 Devin Romanul: Okay. Seconded by Councilor Jamaleddine. On discussion, up first, I have Councilor Jamaleddine.

▶ 1:08:07 Maya Jamaleddine: Thank you. I do appreciate Councilor Kowal to bring this concern to the table. I do also hear Councilor Chen point. Definitely, we need every penny, and we're paying. My concern is we're accepting this money, but at what cost? What is it that we're compromising? And if this is something that is going to put minorities probably at risk, especially with the state that we're going through in this administration, I do feel that we do require more information. The least that we can do is to put it on hold to get more information, and then we can take into consideration whether we should proceed. I think this is a big decision for us, especially for those that don't have voices. So it's the minimum that we can do is to take the time before we vote on it and we accept it, just so we would know what are the risks that we are taking for those people.

▶ 1:09:26 Speaker 2: Thank you.

▶ 1:09:26 Devin Romanul: Any other councilors on discussion? Vice Chair Vandiver.

▶ 1:09:29 Kimberly Vandiver: Can you let us know, is there a specific deadline that you would need us-- If we did postpone this, would we go past the deadline for acceptance of this grant, or

▶ 1:09:38 Speaker 2: Yes, there is a deadline. I believe it's Friday. So I did ask for leniency because I told them we're going through our councilors' schedule throughout the summer, and they didn't think that would be a problem. But yeah, there is a deadline on it.

▶ 1:09:56 Kimberly Vandiver: Okay. This Friday? This Friday. The 17th. Because we don't have a scheduled full council meeting before this Friday that I know of.

▶ 1:10:03 Speaker 2: Am I right? It was the following Friday. It's coming up quickly. That's why I'm glad to get this meeting tonight.

▶ 1:10:11 Speaker 7: Okay. Councilor Jamaleddine.

▶ 1:10:12 Speaker 2: So through the chair, even if we accept it, my understanding, we won't be able to do anything with it because the full council did not vote on it. So we're going to miss Friday either way. I informed MIMA, the people that manage this, that because of the way the council schedules-- I had the date in the email to them saying, "I'm going to be probably a little late. Would that be a problem? Could they afford me some leniency?" And they didn't think it would be a problem. So I did explain to them my situation with the council schedule for the summer meetings. And so it is whatever the date for the full council would have that date. I told them that was going to be the date I'd be able to find out if it's going to be able to be signed

▶ 1:11:00 Maya Jamaleddine: and processed. And would you be able to provide any more details and information before the full council?

▶ 1:11:09 Speaker 2: About the deadline or about the legal issues involved taking- Well, at least about the deadline. We will get more information- Yeah. Okay ... from the solicitor for deadline, at least. Okay. Yeah. I'll see if I can get some actual writing from them, maybe to give us an extra week or something. Thank you. Okay. Thank you.

▶ 1:11:32 Devin Romanul: Perfect. Up next, I have President Freeman.

▶ 1:11:34 Bradley Freeman: Thank you very much, Chair. I want to say at the onset, I very much support this grant. I think it's great, and I look forward to supporting it in Appropriations and before the full council. In respect to Councilor Kowal and Councilor Jamaleddine concerns, many of which I share in terms of what exactly we are signing up for, not just with this grant, but with all future grants, I do think it'd be advantageous to get some sort of guidance from Solicitor Phillips, or through her from the AG's office. So I'm going to support the motion to hold, and also I'm going to request through the chair that the Appropriations Committee tries to meet next Monday prior to our full council meeting, in which case we could hear this then, having already heard it tonight, hear it again then, and comfortable passing it through full council, assuming the information from Solicitor Phillips and the Attorney General is to our satisfaction.

▶ 1:12:24 Devin Romanul: Perfect. Sounds great. Up next, I have Vice Chair Vandiver.

▶ 1:12:28 Kimberly Vandiver: I was going to propose a different solution, which is to send it to full council either with a recommendation to pass or fail, because we can change our mind in full council, but either way that goes, we can still talk about it one more time.

▶ 1:12:41 Devin Romanul: Great. Terrific. Any other commentary? I believe we have a motion that is made and seconded to hold in committee. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

▶ 1:12:50 Speaker 2: Yes. Vice Chair Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kowal? Councilor Abramsky? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. Chair Romanul? Yes. All in favor? All right.

▶ 1:13:08 Devin Romanul: Yes. We will hold in committee and add an A&O hearing next week to our coming attractions. Thank you so much, Chief, for joining us this evening.

▶ 1:13:15 Speaker 2: Thank you so much. Thanks for considering it.