ORDER-2022-108 : An Appropriation From Free Cash, Account Number 01-324001, in the Amount of Six Hundred Thousand Dollars ($600,000) to Parks - Turf Replacement, Account Number 014753-551177

Transcript (~24 min @ 58:20)

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▶ 58:10 Jen Grigoraitis: get something in writing to us just about the timing because it procedurally it will pull up to the full council on the 16th so we know how we can proceed thank you thank you i think you're sticking in your seat for the next order order 2022-108 an appropriation from free cash account number zero one dash three two four zero zero one in the amount of six hundred thousand dollars to parks turf replacement account number zero one four seven five three dash five five one one seven seven and this is offered by mayor broder and we have director proakus ellis and park superintendent ms bell here for with us tonight so the floor is yours hey how are you um as you all know fred

▶ 58:54 Speaker 1: Fred Green Field was put in in 2011 and the life expectancy of a turf field is 10 years. We've maintained it very well and have gotten an extra year and we'll be able to continue until we can get this work done. We're asking for $600,000 for the replacement of Fred Green fabric turf and fence lines all around the high school property. We've had a company come out and evaluate the drainage that's under Fred Green to make sure that it's still in working order and we wouldn't have to add any additional funds there. We were told that the drainage below was actually in better condition than some of the fields they're putting in today, so that was good news. We also had the rubber tested because we looked at possibly replacing it with something else, when you crunch the numbers and get down to it it made more sense to keep the rubber the rubber that we have there was tested it's not it has not degraded it's good for 30 years so all we have to do is bring it back up to you know add additional to bring it back up to conditions for concussion and making sure that we have the the right amounts in there so it made more sense we actually get 25 to 30 cents on the dollar for the rubber that we have there we don't have to ship it out to a pit somewhere or on a boat to deliver somewhere for recycling purposes so in the long run we actually are saving a lot of environmentally as well as far as the fence the gauge fencing that's around the field has it's a very it's a very thin gauge it hasn't taken and the abuse from soccer balls, footballs, equipment, very well. It's beat up a lot. After speaking with the school AD and some of the sports teams, it made sense for us also to do some shifting of gate openings. Right now we have two main entrances onto the field, and that hasn't helped with the wear patterns on the field. we're trying to get more double gate openings to get socket nets they can rule them out instead of trying to rule them turn them drag them and also to shut down an entrance spring and fall so in the fall we can have it where it normally is right now but in the spring the way a patent we can shift to the other side of the field we always try to work with the school department and the ad and coaches you know to have them move around the field more often instead of coming out staying right at the end where they are um and that that really hasn't you know helped so those are the type of things that we're we're trying to improve with the fencing no

▶ 1:01:56 Speaker 3: are there questions from the council counselor vice chairman thank you madam chair um thank you

▶ 1:02:03 Leila Migliorelli: for coming tonight i actually have a question it may be more for mayor broder who's still back there but so the request just looking at the memo you're the design phase would begin this spring summer if approved it would begin this spring summer correct bidding the fall construction next summer just the rationale between like asking for the 600,000 now versus later just well I think that it's after

▶ 1:02:31 Speaker 1: talking to the filter of companies it's very hard to get on their calendars we also have to bid out a portion of this so we still have to go through all that I think that's the the logical explanation is that looking at time material as Elena was saying and talking to the field turf companies it's it's a wait it's not anything so you have to get on their calendar before you can even begin the process to to order and you the whole the whole portion approved

▶ 1:03:06 Speaker 8: by to do to start the process so ideally we'd be bidding the project as soon as this summer and signing a contract as soon as this fall okay so the and then there's the wait time for the materials and for contractors to have the time capacity to do it so really it's um you know it seems like a long ways off to construction but we want to be under contract with a contractor by the fall

▶ 1:03:29 Speaker 7: Okay, and any concern about costs going up? Well, that's part of it. Yeah

▶ 1:03:39 Speaker 3: Okay, thank you counselor Jamal Dean, thank you

▶ 1:03:41 Maya Jamaleddine: Thank you for being with us tonight do we have a list of materials that need to be disposed

▶ 1:03:51 Speaker 1: So the only thing that will be disposed will be the fabric itself Everything else is remaining

▶ 1:03:57 Maya Jamaleddine: okay so just the fabrics and do we have is there any cost for that or everything

▶ 1:04:04 Speaker 1: is it's included everything's included okay yeah no additional cost okay thank

▶ 1:04:10 Jen Grigoraitis: you councillor Stewart and then councillor

▶ 1:04:12 Robb Stewart: Williams Thank You madam chair thank you both for being here at this evening just two-part question how long is the effort going to be anticipated and when will

▶ 1:04:26 Speaker 1: this be performed so the idea was that we have to clear schedules next summer we're hoping to do it after the high school season ends say in June just to at least start the process I from the conversations it shouldn't take longer than four to four to five weeks to do that's if everything goes according to plan so we're hoping to have it up and running by the fall of 23 okay and have

▶ 1:04:52 Robb Stewart: have you spoken to the the users of the field over the summer because it's still it's I know it's hard because it's gonna be disrupted no matter no matter when you do it it's helping them with like refine readjusting their plans for next

▶ 1:05:09 Speaker 1: summers yeah mostly during the summertime it's camps you know what I mean it's yeah so like early morning high school workouts we can still do those at other fields it but it is gonna be we are gonna have to try to help out or find other areas we usually keep the western snow closer in the summer because it's the only rest time it gets in order to you know try to keep it in half decent condition for the fall but it might be something that we have to look at to be able to put a couple camps out there over the summer but most of it those are non those are money-making for you know different people coming in renting our field it's not really our people so much it's our kids I'm sure

▶ 1:05:52 Speaker 4: go to the camps yeah but you know yeah it's very important for the parents to make sure

▶ 1:05:56 Speaker 1: their camps available right i get it i get it we'll have them you know we're going to do our best to try to um you know fit everybody in but yeah it is it's definitely going to be a loss for

▶ 1:06:08 Ryan Williams: some great great thank you thank you thank you counselor williams uh so the the fabric is what's

▶ 1:06:14 Speaker 1: being disposed of correct what's it made out of nylon rubber backing where does

▶ 1:06:20 Speaker 1: it go so they the recycle they take it to a recycling company who's they I'm sorry the vendor that we hire field turf they have they do this all the time so

▶ 1:06:33 Speaker 5: they I'm sorry the well this particular vendor that we reached out to we're

▶ 1:06:36 Speaker 1: gonna we're gonna put it out but field turf is the original vendor that we have

▶ 1:06:46 Ryan Williams: that put it in in 2011 is this the first time that we've done this recycled this

▶ 1:06:54 Speaker 1: or remove first time we've replaced the field all right have you talked to them

▶ 1:06:56 Ryan Williams: about their recycling practices do you have confidence that their recycling

▶ 1:07:04 Speaker 1: practices are legitimate I would think that they have to yeah I mean we can follow up on it but I'm sure they meet all state and federal guidelines there

▶ 1:07:11 Ryan Williams: well there are no state and federal guidelines for recycling turf that's what I ask the average turf field has about 40,000 pounds of plastic mm-hmm right that's a lot of plastic this is the council that banned plastic straws because we were all so worried that it was gonna wind up in the environment and so I I would really urge a very solid verified and maybe get these folks in here you know at some point to talk to us about what their plan is for recycling this stuff I know that it can be reused very hard for it to be actually recycled into new material you cut it up into like doggy pee pads and things like that that's the kind of thing that I would want to see and feel very confident that it's happening because you know there are some towns in Massachusetts where very well-meaning and hard-working folks in the city have said this is absolutely going to happen and then somebody walks out behind the school and finds it in a ravine you know two years later and it just it is it isn't the city's fault you know it's just the nature of trying to dispose of

▶ 1:08:16 Speaker 1: the companies that we we have worked with a very reputable they do Gillette Stadium I think that I mean what we'll get whatever information that you okay

▶ 1:08:29 Speaker 8: there you want I appreciate it thank you very much mm-hmm we did also have an extensive conversation with them about recycling of materials on our last call where we fortunately learned that because they don't have to pull the rubber out that's a huge you know environmental benefit that they don't have to put that somewhere or recycle it or dispose of it but they did indicate that different communities put different things in their specifications as to what they want to happen with the materials and basically that you know there's a cost to doing X Y & Z with the materials but they're always willing as as long as it's in the bid price they're always willing to do whatever so they said that you know some some communities when they pull out the rubber they don't want it to go to incineration they want to go to recycling and it has to be trucked all the way across the country you know I think they said sixty thousand dollars more we will absolutely do that so I think it's also about how

▶ 1:09:24 Ryan Williams: we write our specs for them I would I would I would myself personally I would be happy to approve a little bit more at the end of this process when we're ready to do it if you came back and said for another fifty thousand dollars they will take this and do it in this certified way that is you know sustainable and shows us that this material is getting a second life I mean you know it's not a huge amount of money so I'd be very interested in following up on that as we to go through the process. Thank you.

▶ 1:09:55 Jen Grigoraitis: Councillor Karamcheti.

▶ 1:09:58 Manjula Karamcheti: Thank you for being here. When I think about Fred Green, I think about it very similarly that I do to like Memorial Hall. It's really like a place for our community to gather and be together. And so really more for the benefit of the public, just could you share a little bit about like who oversees Fred Green, who's responsible for the general upkeep, who makes decisions about field usage, and then how those decisions are made.

▶ 1:10:30 Speaker 1: Okay, so Fred Greenfield is under the parks, which is overseen by the Melrose Park Commission. As far as maintenance of the field, we use the permit fund when we rent fields, and we put that money back into our field. So we hire a company that comes it maintains the field twice a year so that we make sure that it's tested and it's up to power of what it's supposed to be. We also have purchased a couple machines that we use in-house with the green team that can do maintenance on it on a weekly, whatever basis that we need. As far as priority on the fields, the Park Commission's policies have been set for, since I've been here anyway, 15 years. So high school has first priority on all fields. Then comes recreation. After recreation comes Melrose Youth Programs. That's youth programs like Melrose Youth Soccer, anything that is a volunteer-based staff. And then it goes to Melrose Adult Leagues, rentals that they rent. And then it goes to outside, outside user groups, whether it's adults, whatever, youth programs, AAU programs.

▶ 1:11:56 Manjula Karamcheti: Okay, so just to clarify, does that mean that all high school sports, like whether it's football or soccer or whatever, like in the fall season, all of those teams would have the opportunity to schedule dates and times for games and practices before whatever is left would go to the recreation department? Is that how it works?

▶ 1:12:19 Speaker 1: In theory, yes. So the high school has the fields basically from 3 to 6.30. We don't schedule anything. That's the AD. So the AD is the one who schedules all his programming. He sets games for whatever groups. We don't do that. We do time blocks. My office, I'm in charge of permits for all fields in Melrose and the liaison for Pine Bank. so I do all the scheduling at Pine Banks for our youth in high school programming. The ADs, they set their own schedules, right? And they change on a daily basis depending on cancellations, weather, I mean, it could be anything. So yes, he has the priority. We try to keep them within that 3 to 6.30 timeframe. They get a couple night games for senior night or whatever event that they want. but that's not our call, that's the AD's call.

▶ 1:13:16 Manjula Karamcheti: Okay, thank you. That's very helpful in terms of like clarification on how those decisions are made between teams.

▶ 1:13:23 Speaker 1: Gotcha, yeah.

▶ 1:13:25 Manjula Karamcheti: Would you happen to know in relation to like a game versus practice, like do all of the teams get to schedule games on the field first before practices are determined?

▶ 1:13:36 Speaker 1: Call Steven Fogarty.

▶ 1:13:38 Manjula Karamcheti: Thank you, thank you. I will I will do that and then just another question regarding how this Fred Green project fits into some of the other fields a few of the counselors and myself we met with the entire Melrose Veterans Memorial Middle School eighth graders and a high priority on their list was actually the cabbage patch they expressed a lot of concern about its usability its functionality sort of what happens when it rains so on their behalf i'm curious so how does the re-turfing of fred green relate to prioritizing the cabbage patch the knoll that kind of thing um do you want

▶ 1:14:25 Speaker 8: me to take that yeah so we've just completed and actually hopefully the final report will be coming out any day now the el pond park feasibility study and that study did include the cabbage patch as part of what was analyzed the recommendation in that report is to have turf eventually at the cabbage patch but the turf at the west knoll was considered a higher priority by by the working group um so more likely we would see turf first at the west knoll before we would see it at the cabbage patch the whole project all in is roughly 10 million dollars so it's not it's not an insignificant project you know if if there was grant money or some will to suddenly spend ten million dollars in that one location then they would both get turf and we would get a whole bunch of other fantastic improvements at El Pond Park the the project includes improvements to stormwater to the wetlands to the parking area at the knoll what else walking trails oh like a little amphitheater area all sorts of great things for the community but with a price tag of ten million dollars I would

▶ 1:15:41 Manjula Karamcheti: just encourage us to consider the youth voice in terms of sort of their needs and their recreation and sort of and I think what you're talking about is is

▶ 1:15:49 Speaker 1: something that I think everybody who has kids or has played on any of our fields walked any of our fields they didn't call us cornfields for no reason you You know what I mean? So the West Knoll, the East Knoll, and the Cabbage Patch are just in that lowland area that there's not, unless you're redoing it, unless you plan on doing a re-turfing of it or sinking some substantial money into drainage underneath the field. The whole idea is to keep as much grass turf on it as you can, because when it's grass it's absorbing it's drinking it's growing it's not mud but once we get to that area when it turns to mud it's very hard we don't have down time on our fields we don't have that many fields so they're always in play so it's hard to get that that's why you know it's so important sometimes when people get you know aggravated when i shut fields down it is for a reason i mean we're trying to keep it at a level that we don't have to take it offline at any given point in a season you know

▶ 1:17:00 Speaker 7: we try to get through the seasons with it well i appreciate your efforts and dedication to taking

▶ 1:17:06 Speaker 3: care of all the fields okay councillor Garipay thank you madam chair at this time i'd like to

▶ 1:17:08 Mark Garipay: make a motion for uh to the full council for passage second discussion we have a motion

▶ 1:17:15 Jen Grigoraitis: we have a motion to recommend for passage made by councillor Garipay seconded by councillor stewart

▶ 1:17:25 Ryan Williams: is there any discussion councillor williams yes on discussion last piece um does the company disclose whether pfas is present in the material that they're putting down on the field do you

▶ 1:17:33 Speaker 8: know that for a fact we can find that out we can ask and and we probably have it yeah i don't know too much about the specific materials that are used but again we have an opportunity to we'll be writing a bid spec for this material and if it's feasible to get one without pfas we will

▶ 1:17:51 Ryan Williams: try our best to do so it was it was framing him by the way that's where they uh two years ago they were they had a massive amount of turf that was left to rot above their water supply and it just had a pfas in it so it's a nasty ep is you know all over it right now so there's a lot of resources

▶ 1:18:06 Speaker 3: out there thank you there we go councillor Jamaleddine thank you um just to follow up on

▶ 1:18:09 Maya Jamaleddine: my question and counselor william's question um when i ask about this what's the materials that we need to be to be disposed inside um the fabrics and it's all inclusive in the cost so do we know how they're going to dispose it and what are we paying for to be able to compare it with what we would wish how we would wish to be disposed yeah i was looking we had a breakdown

▶ 1:18:44 Speaker 8: at one point from the the um the company who gave us the cost estimate um but we don't have that with us but again you know when we put the project out to bid this is just an estimate from one vendor and so we're going to work with a design consultant who's going to help us produce bid documents and we can we can specify in there whatever we want in terms of disposal or recycling or whatnot and then the bidder who bids on that project would be the one telling us what the price would actually be for the disposal versus the new material so you know with the level of estimate that we have right now we don't necessarily have hard numbers on that right so we don't know as

▶ 1:19:36 Maya Jamaleddine: if now what is the basic how would be the basic disposal right well we can specify that in our bid

▶ 1:19:39 Speaker 8: document okay so we don't know at this time but it's our choice so it's not inclusive that's what

▶ 1:19:49 Speaker 8: i'm trying to explain it is inclusive in the estimate that we got because the company indicated that it's included that they have a list of what their price does and does not include

▶ 1:20:05 Maya Jamaleddine: and somewhere in here it says so i guess i i don't want to take more from your time i guess my question is if you're going to come back and ask for more money for disposal with that more you know um environmental uh friendly disposal um i i wanted to know that i want to be able to compare are we disposing as if now with this offer so with this office and i i'm just saying i don't

▶ 1:20:30 Speaker 1: know what it is but if this offer is to dispose it in a landfill say then that's the price we're getting on this if we want to truck it across the country and have it cut up and recycled or whatever then that would be the additional the additional fee so that's what we'll find out for

▶ 1:20:50 Speaker 8: you we do have a little contingency in the um built-in built-in the construction cost estimate that we have is 525 000 and then we need cost for design we need cost for construction oversight and so we have 75 000 for design and construction oversight but there's a little contingency in there since we are still at a planning level so it may be feasible that we can cover the cost entirely even with recycling with the with the price that we have but we just won't know that

▶ 1:21:24 Speaker 8: so you won't be able to get more information as of now no we would have to get into the design hire a design consultant and get those bid documents ready and then they would give us a construction cost estimate a more official um you know engineer's estimate based on an actual

▶ 1:21:40 Maya Jamaleddine: design and then then we'd have a better idea and the turf that we're gonna put as if like we're going to replace is it good for 10 more year or it's 10 more years yeah okay baseline 10. you

▶ 1:21:49 Speaker 1: could get up to 12. yes thank you anyone else on discussion okay mr clerk can you please call the

▶ 1:22:06 Speaker 6: role vice chair migliorelli yes councillor mcmaster yes councillor eccles yes councillor Garipay yes

▶ 1:22:11 Speaker 6: Yes. Councillor Jamaleddine?

▶ 1:22:16 Speaker 7: Councillor Stewart?

▶ 1:22:17 Speaker 6: Yes. Councillor Karamcheti?

▶ 1:22:19 Speaker 4: Yes.

▶ 1:22:20 Speaker 6: Councillor Obremski? Yes. Councillor Williams? Yes. President Sinella? Yes. Chair Gergaritas? Yes. It's unanimous. 11 yes. 11 yes. So it passes. Thank you both for being here tonight.