ORDER-2026-2 : Amending Chapter 202 of the Revised Ordinances of the City of Melrose Streets and Sidewalks

Transcript (~16 min @ 55:43)

Speakers identified by voice; unnamed voices are numbered within this recording. Auto-caption text — verify against the video.

▶ 55:43 Speaker 6: Yes. Council gpe? Yes. Council Vander Bear. Yes. President Elli? Yes. Motion passes.

▶ 55:48 Devin Romanul: Alright. Motion passes. Thank you very much. Thank you. Moving on to our second item ID number 1 2 7 4 3 amending chapter 2 0 2 of the revised ordinance of the city of Melrose Streets and Sidewalks.

▶ 56:06 Speaker 5: Okay. So for streets and sidewalks, um, I'll do the same. I'll just run through the memo that we submitted with the red line version. Um, so first off, the first change updates the language in section 2 0 2 3 to allow bicycles to be ridden on sidewalks except in business districts and excluding motorized vehicles not needed for mobility purposes. That has been our practice. And just to explain a little bit of the reasoning behind that too. Um, when we apply for our Complete Streets grant projects, we have oftentimes stated that in elementary school neighborhoods improvements to sidewalks are improvements to cycling, um, facilities because, you know, on, on road bike lanes are not really the right treatment for six year olds riding a bike to school. Um, and so we've sort of taken credit for sidewalks being our preferred method of little kids riding their bikes to school. And we've always had this language in the ordinance, which has been a little inconsistent with sort of what we're trying to, um, encourage, especially in those, um, school districts. So I thought that we would clean that up. Um, removing the reference to refundable deposits for the engineering division permits. In the 10 years I've been here, we've never collected deposits, so I'm not sure how old that, um, provision is, but it's not something we've done in the last decade. Uh, the bonds, we have upped our bonds to 10,000 performance and payments bonds instead of 5,000 because 5,000 really doesn't cover. Um, if we have a road that's not properly repaired from a trench 5,000 doesn't cut it anymore. If we had required a curb to curb restoration, um, we've updated the insurance language for consistency with current and future requirements. I believe we just changed it to a reference to the city's current insurance. Um, rather than putting in the specific numbers, clarified the work hour provisions clarified the applicability of construction procedures in the ordinance, um, to be consistent with current practice, um,

▶ 58:10 Speaker 5: actions in the event of improper private work. Again, to be consistent with current practice. Um, same with violations we're clarifying, there's a provision there that talks about police details and says they're usually the responsibility of the private proponent, but really they're always the responsibility of the, the, um, project proponent proponent for private work. Um, on all of the DP W's other fees, we had moved everything to a schedule of fees that's maintained by the DPW so that each time we want to raise the fee, let's say it costs us $3 to dispose of a car tire, and then our price to dispose of it goes up to $4. We now can raise those fees, um, from all of our other, other ordinance sections, the solid waste and recycling the water, sewer and drains. We have those all in a schedule of fees that no longer sits in the ordinance, but we had missed doing that with the streets and sidewalks schedule of fees. And actually Council Williams had brought it to our attention, um, earlier this year with reference to block parties when we tried to change the fee and realized that it required an ordinance change. Um, so we've tried to be consistent with our other schedule schedules of fees and just reference that instead. Um, and then updated language for some reason, the, the, um, I believe the council had authority about curbing requirements, which was sort of an oddball thing in the ordinance because pretty much everything else was city engineer. So we updated that to city engineer.

▶ 59:41 Devin Romanul: Great. Thanks so much. Any counselors have questions? Councillor ver

▶ 59:45 Kimberly Vandiver: Thank you. I have two questions. Um, the first one's probably easy, but just re relevant to the related to the city engineer. I know that position is vacant. There, there are some references to or designee. I wonder if we also need an or acting city engineer. Do we have an acting city engineer? You are the, I, I see. Yes. Okay. You're act also acting as that role. Okay. So that would be covered under the language.

▶ 1:00:06 Speaker 5: Yeah, I think, or designee really covers it anyway, but yeah, I would, I would consider it the acting city engineer is filling the role of the city engineer, just not in a permanent capacity.

▶ 1:00:16 Kimberly Vandiver: Wonderful. Thank you. And then the, the slightly um, more involved question I had was, um, so on the third page of this document that's attached here in three A about streets and sidewalks, red line, um, near the bottom of the page, um, 2 0 2 dash three riding or driving on sidewalk. Um, so the, what I was looking at this and wondering about was, um, how this would apply to any, um, scooters and how it would apply to any, um, e-bikes that are pushed by hand. Um, I in particular, um, we have in this red line no motorized vehicles of any kind or permitted density sidewalks. I wonder if that should be no motorized vehicles of any kind are permitted to be driven on city sidewalks. Could I push one of these items and then park it at a, um, at a bike parking ramp, you know, in front of a restaurant or something like that? Is that Okay. To bring it onto the sidewalk at all. Um,

▶ 1:01:12 Speaker 5: Yeah, no, that's a good point. If you're, you know, locking up a motorized scooter to one of our lollipop bike racks on the sidewalk, you will have to bring it up onto the sidewalk that, um, the intent is that, um, no motorized vehicles of any kind are permitted, I suppose, to be driven on city sidewalks. Is that the wording? Yeah, exactly. Suggested, Yeah, I, I have no problem with that amendment.

▶ 1:01:36 Kimberly Vandiver: So, um, I would propose that amendment in that section 2 0 2 3, um, just adding the words to be driven so that they're permitted to be there, but not permitted to be driven on the sidewalk

▶ 1:01:45 Devin Romanul: To be driven dur inserted in which, uh, part of that, uh,

▶ 1:01:48 Kimberly Vandiver: Uh, in the red line section, uh, the final sentence of 2 0 2 dash three. So the last sentence would read, aside from those required for mobility, no motorized vehicles of any kind are permitted to be driven on city sidewalks.

▶ 1:02:05 Devin Romanul: Alright, so Motion Bay by Councillor Vandiver to insert to be driven, um, in that sentence. Second. Second. Councillor gpe. Second on discussion.

▶ 1:02:17 Speaker 3: All those in favor? Aye. Aye. All is opposed.

▶ 1:02:21 Devin Romanul: Let the ayes have it. The amendment is approved. Any other counselors have questions?

▶ 1:02:27 Speaker 3: Councillor Uh, Williams. Thank You. Um, so sorry, I gotta get my notes.

▶ 1:02:35 Ryan Williams: The eBike thing was a good catch. Um, I'm wondering how in this section we enforce the inappropriate use of motorized vehicles on sidewalks. There's nothing in the ordinance itself that says, what do you do if somebody, you know, rides their motorcycle down the sidewalk? Um, I know that there are fines for operating motor vehicles and parking motor vehicles on sidewalks. Do you think that it is, um, necessary to reference those fines in this section, or would it be helpful to reference the fines in the section?

▶ 1:03:08 Speaker 5: So in 2 0 2 dash 3.1, under use of gas power vehicles, scooters, power boards, and many motorbikes, it does say penalties. Any person in violation, any person violating the provisions of the section shall be subject to a fine of $50 enforcement. The Melrose Police Department shall have the authority to enforce this section. The provisions of MGL Chapter 40, section 20 1D may be used to enforce this section. I don't know the MGL reference, but I would think that's, that covers what you're referring to.

▶ 1:03:40 Ryan Williams: Yeah, it's actually, it's interesting to me. So the penalty in 2 0 2 3 for

▶ 1:03:50 Ryan Williams: putting a motorized vehicle on a sidewalk is twice the fine, I think for the police find ticketing somebody for parking on a sidewalk. And I don't expect the committee to hash that out here, but I, I just thought of something to, to point out that in my review of the Streets and sidewalks ordinances in the city, we have kind of a lot of competing, you know, where DPW and the police kind of overlap in some of these ordinances. And I'm not a voting member of the committee, so I can't propose any kind of, um, any kind of amendment. But I do think it's important to enforce the, um, enforce not having motorized vehicles parked or operated on sidewalks. Um, so with that being said, I, I had, um, an interesting question about the schedule of a fee. So you brought up, you brought up the, the story that Yes, the resident reached out to me, surprised that the black parties had been, um, made to have a hundred dollars fee. Asked me, I looked at the code, I saw that they were in the code as free. Um, and now we're proposing getting rid of the fine section in the code, and I think in some cases that makes a lot of sense. I don't know why the engineering department is issuing block party permits.

▶ 1:05:09 Speaker 5: It's not really the engineering division, it's actually the, it's more, um, through the DPW itself. Yeah, the forms are available at engineering. Yeah. But they get processed through, uh, our admin, our DPW admin division. So, um, once they come into either engineering or our main office, they go to one of our, um, actually one of our account clerks mm-hmm. Who handles the applications, um, make sure that the police chief, the fire chief and I have all, or me or Jim Troop have signed off on the application, made sure that that the location is appropriate, the times are appropriate. We have had ones we've had to deny. Sure. Um, and then passes that along. She then manages our, um, uh, operations staff delivering the equipment to the block parties on Friday before usually their weekends. So typically on Friday afternoon, our operations staff, our highway division, we'll drop off barricades at all the houses where that are using them, and then on Monday morning, pick them all back up.

▶ 1:06:13 Ryan Williams: Yeah. So I guess the thing that I find interesting about the block party permit is that it is the only thing that is explicitly listed as having no charge. And I read that as being language that's intentional in the ordinance to not have a charge for the block party. Um, and, you know, if we take that item f out of the ordinance, then you could make it a hundred dollars or $200 or $300, whereas some communities actually will give residents money to have a block party because they recognize the social benefits of having, you know, occasional use of the street for, um, for that kind of social gathering. So I'm, I'm, I'm hoping that, um, you know,

▶ 1:07:01 Ryan Williams: it would be nice if that could stay free for no charge. Uh, I understand that we're raising fees in some regard. Um, you know, $5 here, $10 there on people raising block party from $0 to a hundred dollars feels a bit strange to me, especially since it's something we should wanna encourage people to do. Um, so I, you know, if I were on the committee, I wouldn't support it. Um, and I think we should look for ways to keep that free by putting it into other ordinance language somewhere else.

▶ 1:07:31 Speaker 5: I will say there is a substantial cost to the city for the, the time and the materials that we use. Um, for instance, porch Fest is a great example. We have to cut people off at a certain point with Porch Fest because we only have a limited number of barriers and barrels and we can't, um, we can't meet the demand, but we end up spending, you know, the better part of a day delivering materials and the better part of a day, um, taking materials back. And I know in the city's current financial situation, um, where we're short staffed, you know, it's not necessarily, I personally don't think it's necessarily the best use of city resources if the residents who are benefiting aren't paying, at least for the time that's being spent to deliver the materials to them and pick it up.

▶ 1:08:19 Ryan Williams: So why couldn't residents pick the materials up themselves if they were approved for the permit from the city

▶ 1:08:24 Speaker 5: Yard? They could, but we usually are giving the, um, the plastic barriers that are the long Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Hole with the two sort of sawhorse ends, um, when that's what we're delivering. It's a little unruly to throw in your car, but I mean, there are plenty of people who drive SUVs and pick up trucks who could for sure. Who could take them. That is a possibility. Um, we, because we don't set them up right. We bring them before the event, the residents do set them up themselves, so Right, right. Maybe there could be a, you know, a, a sliding fee structure where okay, if you come and get it, it doesn't cost as much or Okay.

▶ 1:08:58 Ryan Williams: Yeah. Well, I appreciate your thought on that. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. That's all.

▶ 1:09:02 Speaker 3: Councilor Ger pay.

▶ 1:09:03 Mark Garipay: Just a quick thing on the block parties, um,

▶ 1:09:08 Speaker 4: I, We, we drop off barricades.

▶ 1:09:11 Mark Garipay: Um, do we usually get everything back or I guess most of it, guess at the end of the end of the season, I'm wondering is, is it a financial cost that we have to replace things that was never, never returned? I guess

▶ 1:09:22 Speaker 5: There's, there's a little bit of that more with, if we're dropping off cones or smaller things, cones disappear. Mm-hmm. Um, the barricades themselves, I don't know of any instance where a whole barricade has been gone that we dropped off, but, um, and same with barrels. I don't know of instances where those have disappeared, but it is certainly a concern. Um, like when we used to do the Slow Streets initiative or some of the pilot work that we've done, those cones, you know, half of them are gone by the time we go to pick them up

▶ 1:09:49 Mark Garipay: Again. Um, to Council Williams' point, I think block parties are, are great for the community. I think they build strong neighborhoods. Um, I understand our financial situation. I would just encourage if things change and we're in a different position next year that we look at maybe reducing, reducing that down back to zero. But, uh, I think, uh, I think it's builds, builds good, uh, good, good strong neighborhoods when you have block party and people out, so.

▶ 1:10:16 Speaker 5: Great. Thank you. Yeah, I agree. Thank you.

▶ 1:10:19 Speaker 3: Any other questions? Councilor Vanderberg

▶ 1:10:22 Kimberly Vandiver: And just briefly echoing that, I also think block parties are, are really a great thing for the community. I think it would, if it doesn't add too much overhead, would be nice to have those options in place for people to pick up or to pay for drop off. Um, and I also wanted to mention, since we're kind of digging into a couple of changes here, but overall, I just wanna say I really appreciate the amount of detail to go through and review this line by line and make these updates and adjustments. So thank you. Thanks.

▶ 1:10:49 Speaker 3: What is the role of the committee?

▶ 1:10:53 Speaker 4: Motion to recommend Second.

▶ 1:10:55 Devin Romanul: Motion to recommend by Council Repay, seconded by President mre,

▶ 1:11:00 Speaker 4: What I believe recommend as amended Motion to Recommend Motion to

▶ 1:11:02 Speaker 3: Recommend as amended. Yes. We're

▶ 1:11:04 Mark Garipay: on that conversation for a while, so I forgot. Motion to recommend as amended.

▶ 1:11:08 Devin Romanul: Thank you very much. Um, on discussion.

▶ 1:11:13 Speaker 3: Madam Clerk, could you please call the role

▶ 1:11:15 Speaker 6: Vice chair remodel? Yes. Council oppe? Yes. Council Vandiver? Yes. Present Elli? Yes. Motion passes.

▶ 1:11:23 Devin Romanul: Thank you very much, um, given the time, uh, I'll entertain a motion to, uh, recess. So moved. Uh, motion made