Appropriations & Oversight Committee — 2018-05-17

Attendance

Manisha Bewtra present · Alderman at Large; Robert A. Boisselle present · Ward 4 Alderman; Scott M. Forbes absent · Vice Chair; Jennifer L. Lemmerman present · Chair; Kate Lipper-Garabedian absent · Alderman at Large; Shawn M. MacMaster present · Ward 5 Alderman; Monica C. Medeiros present · Alderman at Large; Peter D. Mortimer present · Ward 6 Alderman; John N. Tramontozzi present · Ward 1 Alderman; Francis X. Wright Jr. present · Ward 3 Alderman; Michael P. Zwirko present · President/ Ex-officio Member

Agenda

1. Call to Order (0:00)
2. Public Participation (0:22)
3. Orders
4. ORDER-2018-169 : AN ORDINANCE AUTHORIZING REVOLVING FUNDS IN THE CITY OF MELROSE (1:45)
5. ORDER-2018-183 : City of Melrose Operating Budget for Fiscal Year 2019 in the amount of $79,399,945.73 (Seventy-Nine Million, Three Hundred Ninety-Nine Thousand, Nine Hundred Forty-Five Dollars and Seventy-Three Cents). (4:10)
6. Adjournment (1:34:38)

Minutes

CITY OF MELROSE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE CALENDAR● MAY 17, 2018 Aldermanic Chamber, Melrose City Hall Budget Hearing 7:30 PM 562 Main Street, Melrose, MA 02176 The public should take notice that the Melrose Board of Aldermen may, on certain occasions, have a quorum in attendance due to standing committees of the Board of Aldermen consisting of both voting and non-voting members. Members attending this duly posted meeting are participating and deliberating only in conjunction with the business of the standing committee. Attendee Name Title Status Arrived Jennifer L. Lemmerman Chair Present Scott M. Forbes Vice Chair Absent Peter D. Mortimer Ward 6 Alderman Present Robert A. Boisselle Ward 4 Alderman Present John N. Tramontozzi Ward 1 Alderman Present Francis X. Wright Jr. Ward 3 Alderman Present Monica C. Medeiros Alderman at Large Present Manisha Bewtra Alderman at Large Present Kate Lipper-Garabedian Alderman at Large Absent Shawn M. MacMaster Ward 5 Alderman Present Michael P. Zwirko President/ Ex-officio Member Present

ORDER-2018-169 Revolving Fund/Reauthorization AN ORDINANCE AUTHORIZING REVOLVING FUNDS IN THE CITY OF MELROSE Hold

ORDER-2018-183 Operating Budgets (City, School, Regional School) City of Melrose Operating Budget for Fiscal Year 2019 in the amount of $79,399,945.73 (Seventy-Nine Million, Three Hundred Ninety-Nine Thousand, Nine Hundred Forty-Five Dollars and Seventy-Three Cents). Tabled Appropriations Committee City of Melrose Page 1 Updated 5/21/2018 3:43 PM

Transcript

▶ 0:00 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: Good evening. The hour being 7.30 on May 17th, 2018. I call to order the Appropriations Committee of the Melrose Board of Aldermen. This meeting is being recorded and streaming live on MMTV. It will also be available on MMTV's website as well as the City of Melrose website going forward. Motion to open the floor for public comment. Madam Chairman? Second. We have a motion to open the floor for public comment made by Alderman Mortimer, seconded by Alderman Boisselle. uh before we get to that i'd just like to call the the role uh we have tonight with us i'm the chair alderman lemmerman we also are joined by all members of the committee alderman mortimer alderman Boisselle alderman Tramontozzi alderman medeiros alderman Bewtra alderman mcmaster

▶ 0:45 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: and presidents werco would also just note that alderman forbes and alderman Letter garabedian both reached out they are unable to make it this evening but alderman Letter garabedian did send some questions um that i will i have before me and should they not come up in the course of the committee's discussion i will present them as department heads come forward on the motion to open the floor for public comment we have a motion made and seconded all in favor any opposed the floor is now open this is the portion of our meeting that any member of the public may come forward and speak on any item on our agenda motion to close the floor for public comment madam chair second we have a motion to close the floor for public comment by alderman mortimer

▶ 1:30 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: seconded by alderman Boisselle all in favor any opposed the first item on our agenda this evening is order 2018-169 an ordinance authorizing revolving funds in the city of melrose this is an item that has come before us each evening as we go through the departments that have revolving funds this evening we do have two that will be before us this evening the BB estate as well as the Health Department ocean remove that order from the table second not sure that we that we need that as it's been held in committee and it's up on our agenda it hasn't been tabled with your permission uh madam chair may i speak informally please thank you um we have had a motion to hold this is a strange way we are operating under

▶ 2:22 Peter D. Mortimer: new parameters from the state directive in committee we have done in the past motions to hold in committee at the full board where it's a little more formal we've had a motion to lay the order on the table but it seems that um and this is certainly open to a variety of opinions if we're going to continue to keep bringing this order out it's kind of awkward to say to remove it from hold to take it out from hold if we take it out and then incorporate the particular revolving accounts for the particular night back into it then we can lay it back on the table so just a humble suggestion we may want to uh treat it with the uh more formal policy and continue to lay it on the uh table but either way we'll get there i'm just sure thank you alderman i

▶ 3:13 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: believe we can check the rules um i believe if something is held in committee it then comes up on the agenda um at the next committee so we could just bring up the the agenda item again very good thank you we can check that i appreciate it um is there do you i i we do need to actually address your order your motion has been made do you um if if somebody feels it's worthy of a second is there a second to the motion to to remove the agenda from the table i'm sorry no second yep all in favor any opposed the item is before us I'm going to suggest that perhaps we take a motion to join these orders for the purposes of discussion 2018-169 and 2018-183, and then we can separate them back out at a later date.

▶ 4:13 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: So I'd like to make that motion now. We have a motion to join Order 2018-169 with Order 2018-183. Second. Seconded by Alderman Tramontozzi. Point of order. Discussion? I don't see the Order 169 on our agenda this evening. It's the first one. Okay. Yeah, I do. I apologize. I had the wrong one up. You're right. Okay. Thank you. Any further discussion on the motion to join the orders? all in favor aye aye any opposed these orders will be joined uh going forward for for this evening um so we now have the full agenda which is the the two items before us on in front of us at the moment so we will move forward at this point with the departmental hearings we are going to start this evening with department 121 which is the mayor's office

▶ 5:35 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: in the amount of 320 thousand six hundred seventy dollars and fifty cents and we have uh mike lindstrom here this evening if we have a motion to suspend the rules motion to spend the rules by alderman mortimer second second by alderman Tramontozzi all in favor aye aye any opposed thank you Mr. Lindstrom thank you would you like to start with an opening statement absolutely the mayor's office continues to be the central point to communication for all residents businesses board of aldermen elected officials our role mainly is leading the implementation of all policies citywide projects and initiatives in addition to managing all city department heads we oversee all city sponsored events and all constituent services and requests and I would

▶ 6:17 our office especially you know in addition to the day-to-day requests constituents for dpw inspectional you know those sort of things there's also a lot of very heavy issues that come through our office too regarding housing employment you know sensitive issues that are you know take up a lot of uh the day but you know that bridget and i deal with on a day-to-day basis along with the mayor um in fy 19 the mayor's office budget represents level funding outside of a scheduled salary increases 100 of the mayor's office is funded through the operating budget i think this is the third or fourth year in a row of that i do like to point out the dues and memberships that our office does pay i think that's one of the most critical money that's spent in the city

▶ 6:56 it funds the the mass municipal association as well as our dues for the metro mayor's coalition and that is um very important advocacy groups to have make sure melrose has a voice at the table i think uh mayor inferno was in office for about a week and she was already in meetings with the speaker of the house the speaker the you know uh senate president in the governor's office Through our community outreach line item, I think this year we were able to do a ton of great things. They include the dedication of the World War II monument, we were either to partially fund or supplement or fully fund all these events, the World War II memorial, the senior sign up event for city discounts, we had over 100 seniors show up at Memorial Hall over two

▶ 7:33 days to sign up for discounts for trash, water, sewer, senior property exemptions, the Four corners music festival the melrose iftar dinner the mayor's math meet the downtown summer stroll we also run a second grade library card program where every second grader goes to the library and gets a library card to make sure they're introduced to the melrose public library senior barbecue and the national 10 minutes to a park program this year where we partnered with the sierra club the trust of public land and melrose was recognized as a community when they started going towards small cities that had parks within 10 minutes to almost every resident healthy melrose the intergenerational spring fling the melrose kids club we run every

▶ 8:12 month a summer kickoff concert and of course the memorial day parade and the uh accompanying events other questions from the committee i'll move with yours thank you uh i just uh i know at one point we had um the administrative assistant position was from time to time working an additional day in a different department and that has ceased and it's a hundred percent yep it's a hundred percent so when we did second meters it was one year where ten percent of bridget was on water and sewer there was one year when we uh she did recycling outreach it was there but she's four days a week bridget so our office is really 1.8 ftes uh so bridget's four days a week but she's often here on friday unpaid yes and we appreciate that

▶ 9:02 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: a lot uh the iftar dinner i was under the impression that that was through the human rights commission we do what we our office pays for the custodian the custodian okay thank you very much thank you thank you motion to recommend this budget for passage second we have a motion to move the bottom line by alderman mortimer seconded by alderman boisselle on discussion i do have um a couple of questions here that were that were submitted by alderman super garabedian um could you give a brief update on the three initiatives mentioned in the in the memo the medical marijuana dispensary the public safety building study and the implementation of the plat yeah sure the public the public building safety uh committee uh that moves forward on its

▶ 9:42 own track so i think as the um john shenna will be sending out an email i think either tomorrow or next week early next week to talk about to get the group together for the next meeting which alderman lemmerman is the automatic representative uh rob van campen has recently reached out again to our public safety unions to continue the dialogue about any concerns or impacts to you know their collective bargaining agreements that any new project would have so we do continue the dialogue on that project in terms of the plastic bag ordinance that for the larger retail operations that hits July 1st and we've sent now two correspondence to every business in Melrose one mailed one hand delivered and we've got a lot of good feedback a

▶ 10:22 lot of good questions as our office has been the point of contact just about the implementation of it but I would say overwhelmingly businesses have been on board and it's just a little bit of a you know a bit of education project for them to you know everyone getting on the same page but it's it's going well in terms of the medical marijuana selection we hoped you know we went through a pretty extensive process over the last year whittling down prospective candidates and groups going to different cultivation areas and also to different retail operations and we're very comfortable with the selection we made garden remedies and i know they just went through the special permitting process with the planning

▶ 10:59 Manisha Bewtra: board and i know they hope to be uh up and running i know sometime early fall great thank you and are there any initiatives that you've wanted to um undertake but have been unable to pursue in light of the budget situation uh we'd always want to do more business is booming though so i don't know if that means we're doing a good job or a bad job but we've never been busier okay thank you alderman future uh thank you for all you do i am i think there's so many great resources that come out of the mayor's office um i guess shout out to bridget for the the mayor's blog which is a really great resource um and thank you for everything you do in terms of responding to constituent concerns um you did mention something regarding um that in the past that there may have been other funds

▶ 11:49 Manisha Bewtra: or it sounded like you alluded to that um regarding um the mayor's uh portion of the budget uh not just coming out of operating can you expand on that or have has there ever been other funding besides in terms of salary and wages yeah or or i mean i guess other grants i mean when i first started with the city i was paid out of the bond to rebuild ward two monica's and alderman khan and alderman lemon's neighborhood uh bridget from time to time a portion of her salary would be charged to an appropriate department if she was doing it when we had like the putting in the new meter program or something like that but there's never that's that's our operation yeah absolutely i mean obviously you're clearly very clearly city operations but i just wanted to sort of clarify

▶ 12:30 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: and then it doesn't get much leaner than 1.8 people and and and also just to reiterate i appreciate um the continued participation in mma and the metro mayor's coalition as well it's a huge valuable resource we have a motion to move the bottom line that's been made in seconded all in favor any opposed that will be moved forward thank you mr lindstrom and you can stick with us because next we have uh we're gonna do six nine two department six nine two which is the community community events um in the amount of eight thousand dollars sure this might as well just be renamed the memorial day parade um because this funds this this these funds do fund about seventy percent of the cost of the parade which this year is um the theme is one team one fight

▶ 13:13 It's an honor all veterans and our new veterans service director Karen Burke and Jen Wade have been doing an amazing job Just starting the job, you know Karen just putting this all together with with the committee The parade will begin at 1 30 With all cars and assembling at Memorial Hall at 1230 and with participants assembling at 1 What this funds what these funds do is pay for the bulk of the parade the bands But we are always seeking donations as we use the mayor's office community outreach to supplement part of this of this event also but we do we do always welcome donations and those could be reach Karen Burke in the veterans office and we'd be more than happy to take it move to bottom line second by Alderman Board sell seconded by Alderman Mortimer

▶ 14:01 Monica C. Medeiros: on discussion all in favor oh excuse me Alderman Medeiros thank you I just I i just want to take a moment to say that this is you know this is primarily the memorial day parade but it really is something special that we we do this in melrose so many other communities have have chosen to do away with their memorial day parades and their memorial day celebrations and it's really um you know a special thing that we are able to do that here in melrose and we do it on sunday uh may 27th i know that mr lindstrom mentioned the start time at 1 30 and then with the ceremony to follow over at the cemetery afterwards same route yep and then progressing down uh main street to sylvan to the cemetery thank you thank you all in favor aye aye any

▶ 14:50 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: opposed that will move forward as well thank you mr thank you next up we have department 9-1-1 pensions we are in the amount of five million eight hundred seventy nine thousand four hundred $102.00. We are joined this evening by Adam Trevinsky. Thank you for being here this evening, Mr. Trevinsky. Thank you for having me. Would you like to make an opening statement? No, thank you. Straight to questions. Motion to move the bottom line. Second. Motion to move the bottom line by Alderman Boisselle, seconded by Alderman Mortimer. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? That will be moved forward. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Have a good night. The next item we have is Department 544, the Human Rights Commission, in the amount of $3,000.

▶ 15:44 We are joined by Chair Adam LaFrance. Thank you, Mr. LaFrance, for being here. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Thank you, everyone. Good evening. Would you like to begin by making an opening statement? If you'd like me to. I can share a little bit about what the commission's done in the past year. That'd be great. As you know, in many ways, a lot of what we do is investigate claims of unlawful discrimination, and we try to work to promote goodwill, awareness of human rights, understanding of diverse cultures in our community and around, and much more. In the past year, regarding investigations, we've received approximately 12 reports or complaints concerning human or civil rights, including, for instance, five instances of

▶ 16:31 hate symbols or speech in the form of graffiti, four of which in our schools, and one involving an interneighbor harassment and defacement of property. Others to varying degrees include an incident of verbal harassment on Main Street, vandalism at the Netherlands Cemetery, and the municipal response to an incident at the Hoover Elementary School. We remained in regular communication with the Melrose Police Department and the Mayor's Office during the investigations of those incidents and worked closely with Melrose Public Schools as well. As to programming in the last year, the Commission's facilitated its annual program series, including including the well-known international Welcome Potluck in November and the Martin Luther

▶ 17:10 King Day of Service and Dinner and Ceremony in January. Some of the newer initiatives this year included a partnership with the Melrose Community Association, Melrose Organizers for Real Equality, on a handful of programs, including a training on being a proactive bystander, and an initiative entitled In Real Life, a Melrose Story Hour that uses the power of storytelling to bring together diverse members of the community to share stories around topics in which we all have something in common. Other programs have included, in collaboration with the Office of the Middlesex District Attorney, Marion Ryan, and the MHRC's long-standing English Conversation Program, we organized a training on immigration law and best practices for situations involving immigrants and interactions

▶ 17:54 with federal agents. In partnership with the Melrose Police Department and Chief Lyle, we held a town hall event to address topics and questions relating to law enforcement and federal immigration law at the local level. In August of last year, in collaboration with the Melrose Interfaith Clergy Association, the Melrose Alliance Against Violence, the League of Women Voters of Melrose, and again more, the MHRC participated in a community vigil, responding to local and national instances of hate speech. And now in its third year, referenced earlier, with nearly triple the number of attendees as the first year is the popular community Iftar dinner, which continues to grow. year's event will be held on Friday June 8th at Memorial Hall everyone's invited

▶ 18:38 but there is a there is a cap so check the website for tickets in response to the increased instances of hate symbols and speech we've also organized a community response task force that's involved several local stakeholders to investigate strategies by which the community may respond effectively to incidents in the community and finally this year the MHRC celebrated 25 years of working on behalf of the community. Among other things, we held an event on International Human Rights Day to honor, celebrate and thank the original founders of this body and the 65 individuals who served or continue to serve on this commission and who dedicated their time and energy to trying to ensure that human rights have meaning close to home.

▶ 19:18 Michael P. Zwirko: These are just a few examples of our ongoing work. We anticipate many interesting and important things ahead in the next year. So thank you for your continued support and I'm happy to answer any questions. Questions or no? Motion to vote. Thank you, Madam Chair. All right. That's all right. Thank you for your services, Chair. Is your second year, is that correct? Third. Third, third. So in your, during your tenure as a Human Rights Commission and not only as Chair, you had mentioned something towards the end of your presentation that there, you said, I don't want to mischaracterize what you said, due to an increased hate symbols? something along those lines so my question is have you seen recently or

▶ 20:05 you know an increase in not only investigations that you undertake due to complaints received but also if you could speak a little bit about the the efforts that are going on with increased hate symbols sure yep whether it's a matter of increased incident or increased reporting you know that's unclear in the prior year we had four complaints generally this year we've had 12 only five of which involved symbols or graffiti you know it's sort of difficult to put a finger on on why that is yeah but it is what it is and you know we try to you know we have a protocol for trying to resolve it in collaboration with the in this case the school department and Melrose Police Department we've actually reached out to the ADL the Anti-Defamation League to

▶ 21:00 Michael P. Zwirko: work with them around the idea of hate symbols and learning more about them and how we can respond to them more effectively you know it's interesting times these days so I'm just trying to see how you know what we see you know not only at the national level is kind of trickling down even into our neighborhoods and it appears that unfortunately that it is and you know to go from for the previous year to 12 now I'm just curious if there you know again just in your observation is there any sort of a pattern to it does it come at random does it I mean it's any incident is an unfortunate incident and certainly one that you know we don't want to see in our community but I'm just you know to jump 300% I'm just curious what what I mean I know that there's actions being

▶ 21:54 Michael P. Zwirko: taken reaching out to the clergy and and um i've attended a couple of events about these but uh just does it appear to be random acts does it seem pattern-based you know that you could that you could speak to uh to the extent that um there's any uh more information that has been able to be turned up in an investigation often folks don't know who did it yeah it's just that it has been done and where it does seem fairly random other than the number has increased and I feel like there's any number of speculations as to why some may be more relevant than others well grateful that there's at least an avenue for folks to go to and the role that the Human Rights Commission plays with respect to these

▶ 22:37 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: incidents so I really appreciate all the work that the Human Rights Commission does so thank you for that information those are all the questions I had at this time certainly and thank you and we're going to move the bottom line madam chair second motion to move the bottom line by Alderman Mortimer it's seconded by Alderman Boisselle on discussion. I do have a couple of questions here. Are you aware of the number of municipalities around the Commonwealth that have human rights commissions and do you communicate or share information and ideas with them? As a specific figure, no, but we are working in collaboration with an informal association of other human rights commissions in the region that is trying to map that and then put a finger on that

▶ 23:20 then to reach out to those folks and to start to organize more communication and sharing of information and resources that's a project that's you know in its in its early stages and there are folks of whom I'm aware who are looking around regionally gathering that information trying to put it together and organize but there are several around here some are newer than others for instance Wakefield is new in the last couple years. PBD is exploring it now. Redding has been exploring it for instance. Arlington has a strong Human Rights Commission that we're aware of. So there are a few in the area. Great, thank you. And you mentioned the active hotline that the Commission maintains. How do people find information regarding that? Alderman Lipper-Garabedian

▶ 24:15 noted that she didn't see it on the homepage or the resources page and how often is it used you probably get one phone call a month maybe two sometimes it's just looking for information you know direction to city services which I feel is an important part of our role as well guiding folks to the right resources yeah I'd say approximately once a month and is it on the city website it is and we are looking to advertise it more it's on the city website is on our social media page and the my Melrose why why Melrose is a drop-down menu we have a motion that's been made in second is there further discussion all in favor all right any opposed thank you that item will be moved forward to the full budget thank you very much thank you very much next

▶ 25:11 up we have department 542 the Commission on women in the amount of $2,000 and we are joined by the chair Miss William good evening to make an opening statement so as most of you are aware the Melrose Commission on women seeks to improve the lives of women through education and advocacy one of the major efforts that we have made this year is to try to connect women with each other in our community and also with the community itself we have continued to have a large following on social media primarily Facebook and actually only Facebook and we're surprised with how much good feedback we've had about that and how many people see our posts and comment on them we have also gotten to the point where we are almost full to capacity

▶ 26:21 at some of our meetings, our monthly meetings. And we are, even the large conference room, sometimes it's, you know, more seats are needed. So that's very encouraging to the Women's Commission to see more people engaged and interested in what we're doing. The events this year have focused on many of the same events that we've had in the past. For example, the Victorian Fair and the Walk Against Violence, we have participated in that. We have also started a new set of get-togethers, the networking events, which have been very successful. And even when there was a really big snowstorm, we went forward with it, and there were many people there, so we were very pleased with that. So it's nice to see some positive feedback in terms of the community coming out and showing that there is a need for us to exist.

▶ 27:38 The other things that we have done this year are one of the major things was to conduct a child care survey and to have that sent out both through social media, also at our events, including at the Victorian Fair where we had an iPad available for people to put their information in. We also followed up with a questionnaire to the people who gave us their information, seeking additional input, additional stories. We took the results of that survey and presented it to a few of the aldermen here and got very positive responses. We have also done a great deal with the Veterans Association. We had a wreath-laying ceremony at the new memorial. We also did a homeless veterans drive where the VSO asked us for certain things that they wanted on a wish list.

▶ 28:43 We made an Amazon wish list, and they got a fair almost all of what they asked for plus. We also took part in the veterans panel of female veterans who came to speak and they were phenomenal and inspiring. It was a wonderful event. We also launched the Me Too Melrose Project. You should hear more about that in the fall. We also had a booth at the Healthy Melrose Fair, and we are going to be having on June 8th a professional networking event and professional headshots for career platforms. So if you want to have a picture of yourself, one that's by a professional photographer, and put it on your LinkedIn account, for example, that would be the place to do that. You can sign up. They will be for, I think, five minute slots.

▶ 29:47 So this is very quick and low cost and something that I think many people want to do, but they just don't get around to it. So that's part of our outreach for helping women and others in the community to become more confident and place themselves out into the career world career world if they weren't comfortable with a picture, with a selfie, which you're not supposed to do. We are also continuing our t-shirt sales, which are very successful. We have been especially successful with the infant-sized ones. That has been really well received. Let's see. We also have just done things like the Sally Frank Farmer's Market Booth for public outreach. One thing we really like to do is to try to be open and listen to what the community would

▶ 30:52 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: like more from us. And as I said, we're committed to diversity and we are looking for an additional, we have an open spot for an additional commissioner. So please, if you know people who might be interested, send them our way, and we thank you for your continued support. Questions from the committee? Motion to move the bottom line on this budget, Madam Chair. Second. We have a motion to move the bottom line, made by Alderman Mortimer, seconded by Alderman Voigt-Zell. On discussion, I do have one question, same question for the Human Rights Commission, which is, are you aware of the number of municipalities around the Commonwealth that have similar commissions and do you communicate and share information and ideas with them

▶ 31:38 yes we are aware of them we actually did a survey and we often share on social media the things that they post we had reached out to them when we first formed to see what types of things that they do we are also people have reached out to us in the surrounding communities who would like to have women's commissions in their cities as well and to the extent that we can we have certainly been helpful to them in terms of how it came about here and the steps that were taken to get to that to the to having the commission created by the city we have not done specifically in conjunction with them but we are in contact on social media Great. Thank you. Alderman Medeiros. Thank you. You had mentioned in your department questionnaire, and I think you mentioned talking about the child care survey, so that has been released?

▶ 32:45 Yes. I believe it was—my understanding is that we discussed it with the alderman, and then we were going to—we gave the results of the survey in a meeting. and talked about the results yes so it should be in our minutes yes yes thank you thank you thank you just had one quick question at the very end of your presentation you mentioned that you're soliciting you have an open spot for another Commissioner could you just talk about what some of the qualities or requisites one would need in order to apply for said commissionership sure the first thing is when you look at the language that we are charged with it's uh we want to promote equal uh opportunities for it's about the um let's see foster the advancement of women and

▶ 33:53 girls towards full equality in all areas of life we want people with a passion for promoting equality for women and i think that's the main requirement is to be able to honor that to be a self-starter and want to engage with our with the community in terms of particular qualities some of those qualities i think have to do with um thinking of things that you want to do and anything that you want to do like if you want to focus in one area for example I'm interested in working with the with the high school students we have now two high school students who are also sitting on our student representatives we also have a Women's Empowerment Club representative as well on the Melrose Commission and so basically what we're trying to do is we

▶ 34:59 as a team want to hear what you bring that's why we're looking for diversity if you're interested in elder services or if you're interested in a certain type of career training we want to help you do that and and bring that to our our community well thank you is there a specific deadline that there's an application no no it's open no it's open so if you're interested apply yes and would they send the information their cover letter resume to you is there yes there's a uh melrose commission on women email that they can send it to they can always contact us through facebook messages and we're pretty much always getting back to those people within the day easily all right well thank you for that that's all the

▶ 35:49 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: questions i had thank you for the discussion we have a motion made and seconded all in favor any opposed that will be moved forward to the full budget thank you next up we have department number six one one library uh in the amount of one million forty one thousand seven hundred twenty six dollars twenty nine cents we are joined this evening by linda to Welsh Gardener. Good evening. Good evening. Thank you for being here. Thank you. Forgive my glasses. I'm older than when I started appearing here. Melrose Public Library is part of a resource-sharing consortium comprised of both public and academic libraries. This noble consortium has a membership that pays for a vast array of services and resources including professional cataloging internet access staff

▶ 36:49 training software development and shared library resources we also benefit from group negotiating for both hardware and databases such as EBSCO the value we get from this resource sharing both monetarily and professionally is really incredible the library city budget is supplemented by the support of the Friends of the Melrose Public Library, the Board of Trustees, and the many patrons who make donations to the library throughout the year. The patron donations purchase books, pay for museum passes, and fund in-the-moment needs. The Friends sponsor the majority of programmers who come into the library, purchase music CDs, and fund special projects like updated furniture. The Trustees provide the funding for our computers,

▶ 37:39 for seminars, and for a significant percentage of our books. The trustees are also responsible for the beautiful flowers that welcome patrons to the library. Our grounds are maintained in cooperation by the DPW and the Board of Trustees, and we receive regular compliments. We like to think that our welcoming atmosphere starts on the outside. Technology is now a constant part of our function as a public library, as the ways that we access and disseminate information evolve. The expectations on the library profession for expert knowledge of systems, databases, and applications will only continue to grow even as the community continues to value and make use of our traditional print services. In the same vein, the appreciation of the library

▶ 38:27 as a quiet space for reading and individual study now coexists with the rising use of the library a community space a place for interactive collaborative learning and a place for programming at all ages we continually work to strike those balances the population influx that is such a large topic of conversation with the schools is very evident in the library and the children's room staff are continually adjusting their services and programs to meet the needs of the community from the newest of babies on up. Library staff have been tireless in their efforts to ensure that the library makes available quality services for all of our residents. I am so impressed with their work and accomplishments this year.

▶ 39:15 Their efforts have ranged from traditional circulation, reference, and readers advisory services to a wide range of community outreach and technology assistance. While we do watch the trends of public libraries overall, their priorities are focused on meeting the needs of our melrose community to borrow the words of one of my staff i am proud to work here i am proud of the cohesive team that we are i am proud of the quality programs we offer i am proud of the many services that we provide my staff and i look forward to continuing excellent library services in melrose in fiscal 2019. Thank you. Motion to move the bottom line, Madam Chair. Second. We have a motion to move the bottom line by Alderman Mortimer, seconded by Alderman Boisselle. On discussion, Alderman McMaster.

▶ 40:06 Shawn M. MacMaster: Thank you for being here, and thank you for all your good work. I had a question under supplies and materials. The electronic line item is 106 percent increased from last year. Is that to fund technological advances that you reference in the budget summary that is yes so that specifically is overdrive downloadable media that is where we get our downloadable ebooks and audiobooks and we essentially have not been able to keep up with the demand so we are increasing one of One of the things that your budget narrative referenced was the equitable services that you try to provide to residents of Melrose. Can you talk a little bit about that as it relates to our disabled population and to our immigrant population?

▶ 41:03 I know the latter especially spend a considerable amount of time at the library, and I know the English Conversation Program has run out of there. So can you talk a little bit about those services? Yes. We have our services range from a new service with the Council on Aging for homebound services. We're doing more with outreach. We do have the ESL partnership, which includes both one-on-one tutoring opportunities as well as conversation groups. We have a relatively new online service called Pronunciator, which also helps with ESL and also learning foreign languages. A nice thing about this program is patrons can sign in with their own library card. So rather than it used to be you would get maybe a book or you would get a CD that had

▶ 42:06 Monica C. Medeiros: language learning with pronunciator you can have sort of a my pronunciator so you can bookmark where you are you can take lessons and mark where you're at so it's really much more interactive and progressive for each patron that can be used both for learning English and also for native English language people who want to learn other languages well thank you and your staff are doing I think an amazing job and I know we appreciate thank you thank you could you just explain that this is a the library is an entity I guess if you will or institution that receives you know some of you this funding that we're talking about through the city budget for 1 million 41 thousand seven hundred twenty six dollars and 29 cents but you you get a lot of your funding from donations and

▶ 43:10 could you just sort of speak about that and how in particular books and periodicals and fines and kind of how those sources work absolutely so one part of the budget that you're not seeing today you may notice that the books and periodicals line is actually a little bit lower than the end budget from last year, we will be coming back in September and transferring $20,000 into the book and periodicals account from our fines account. So we are very fortunate that through ordinances and Melrose, all of the fines that we receive for late pleas and such go straight back into our book account. We also receive donations from patrons throughout the year. ranges from memorial donations for specific books we have we have people

▶ 44:08 who will make donations in honor of somebody's birthday we have one local family who the kids save their money and empty out the piggy bank and we use those funds for children's books each year so people donate for a wide variety of reasons and all of those funds go back into the good of the library as well as the trust funds that we mentioned and if somebody did want to donate either books or money what would be the way that they would do that they are always welcome to come and talk to me you can also you could map people mail in a donation and that is completely fine they can drop off a donation of either either cash donation or books can be dropped off at our main desk is there a wish list or anything like that that exists we don't we used

▶ 45:10 to have an Amazon wish list and we do not anymore I think the the Amazon which wish list in a lot of ways kick-started people thinking about making donations to the library and we found that people just started buying people who buy bestsellers they will now buy them and they bring them in when they're done reading them so that evolved to be happening a little more naturally and a lot of the demand is probably for electronic books not necessarily hard books right now it is and actually I'm glad that you mentioned that because we do also if people want to specify there's lots of reasons why people use electronic books it's another thing that I like about accessibility many books are not available in large print in print but if you're able to download

▶ 46:02 them you can change the font things like that and we do have people who specify that they'd like a donation to go to an e-book rather than a print book and we can do that too thank you very much thank you thank you I do have a couple of questions here that were submitted um what is a page employee listed as 1.0 to FTE yes sorry that's library language a page employee is the generally high school students and they put away the books they tidy the shelves they check in occasionally but mostly it's putting away the books and straightening the shelves and the displays great thank you and then can you provide an update regarding the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners construction grant

▶ 46:50 Michael P. Zwirko: yes the update really right now is that we are on the waiting list we continue to be on the waiting list and the progression will depend on when they get funding each year so each year as the state receives funding we will find out how many libraries so it's not entirely how many libraries are on the waiting list it's how much money they get to fund each project and the size of each of those individual projects thank you very much thank you madam chair thank for being here this evening and for your presentation you win the award for having the longest questionnaire so far goes to show all the all that you and your staff do for the community so my question I had spoken to a couple of families over the summer and they noted that not only are both parents working

▶ 47:58 Michael P. Zwirko: but they're you know they don't have the circumstances to be able to travel so on the weekends they really enjoy being able to go to the library because the library is a sanctuary the kids like to go get their books they can hang out there for a couple of hours it's a resource that they can actually use a physical one you know just for local folks and when you have both working parents sometimes the hours aren't really conducive so the only times that they can make it there is during the weekends and it's a long-winded way of saying will you be open on Saturdays and Sundays this summer unfortunately we will not we had hoped that we would get be able to get weekend hours this summer but we were not able to fund that so because this is a level funded budget

▶ 48:40 Michael P. Zwirko: those services will will stay the same that's correct yeah and and and the reason I point that out is because you know this is a real fact of the austere budget that we're dealing with the fact that families will not have the opportunity during the summer months more so which is probably more so important than other months to be quite frank you know it's unfortunate and I personally tried very hard to lobby to get some funding for those hours during the summer and we were unable to come up with it because of well everything that we'll be hearing and we've heard so far so I appreciate the work that you do I know that you would like to be open very much you know you that's why you do what you do is because you want to provide this resource for specifically children

▶ 49:27 parents um so those are all the questions i had at this time we have a motion that's been made and seconded all in favor aye aye any opposed that will move forward to the full budget thank you very much thank you next up we have department number 540 the bb estate in the amount of seven thousand nine hundred dollars and we are joined this evening by jean gorman thank you very much for being here good evening everybody would you like to make an opening statement well i'll be fairly brief but i will say that a couple of years ago we painted the exterior of the baby estate last year we painted the interior and this year we're working on the gardens we hope to improve them um we continue to rent the bb estate out for birthday parties we actually just had a very nice

▶ 50:27 wedding in the garden area we have a big thing now is tea parties and the BB estate is perfect and they use it for wedding showers things like that and we happen to be on a company's website so it's directing a lot of traffic to us right now and they love our house for a tea party we just continue to our artists are in every month we have a different artist that comes in and shows their work they sell the work there they're open on saturdays for the artists we have community groups who will come in and use it for various um meetings that they're having and i guess that's about it thank you questions from the committee motion to move the bottom line second motion to move the bottom Bottom line by Alderman Boisselle,

▶ 51:20 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: seconded by Alderman Mortimer, excuse me. On discussion? All in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? That will move forward. Good, thank you very much. Thank you. Oh, wait, revolving account. What? Is there a revolving account? There is a revolving account. Thank you, Alderman. Are we doing that? I mean, yes, we do have a revolving account. Are there any questions? Since we have joined them together, Alderman Tramontozzi rightfully points out, thank you, that we should discuss that while we have Ms. Gorman in front of us. Are there questions on the revolving account? Do you want to explain what you use it for or what the purpose is? Our revolving account is the money that we get for the rentals, people who come in and have their various events there.

▶ 52:12 That money is put aside, and when we do have a problem in the building, that money helps us cover it. Right now, we actually do have something we're going to be doing in the cellar, which isn't very attractive, but we need to do something down there. So that kind of money that we have put away enables us to do it, and we don't go to the city for money. That explains it. Thank you. Alderman Medeiros. Thank you. And what we have and show here is a $30,000 annual cap, meaning that no more than $30,000 could be spent in a year. Does that seem adequate? It is adequate. I think it is. Thank you. Thank you. Is there a motion? Motion to accept this revolving account. Second. We have a motion to recommend for passage.

▶ 53:08 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: Recommend for acceptance. This revolving account made by Alderman Mortimer, seconded by Alderman Tramontozzi. All in favor? Aye. Point of information, Madam Chair? This is already joined. This revolving account, has this been joined with the previous revolving account? Yes. is yes this is all part of the of the one uh order which is order number 2018-169 they're all together thank you uh any opposed thank you okay thank you next up on our agenda is department 511 health department in the amount of 926 thousand two hundred dollars and five cents we're joined this evening by director ruth clay you'd like to come up and join us to our board members wonderful They're welcome to come up with you.

▶ 54:10 Would you like to make an opening statement? Well, I just wanted to say we have a fantastic health department. We've been very fortunate, the aldermen and the mayors for the past 20 years or so have been very supportive of the department. We've been able to hire some fantastic staff. We offer a broad array of services, including animal control, and substance abuse, and tobacco control, as well as the public health nursing, inspectional services. So, I think we're really a model for the area. I did give you some backup information about the health department. Traditionally, the Alderman, because we have so many grants in our department, we have so many different funding sources I usually give the Alderman a

▶ 55:09 chart which you should have that lists the different positions and the one two three four five six seven eight different funding sources for our small department so it breaks out how many hours people work and which particular funding source so we are funded by the city budget the school budget and a lot grants in the town of wakefield and then there's another narrative that basically explains each line item line by line so if you have any questions it's pretty straightforward thank you questions from the committee uh alderman Tramontozzi i i just have a quick question i noticed the pest control um line item just increases a little bit you know we hate to talk about that but you know and i got a couple calls too so uh can you tell me is there something

▶ 56:03 in terms of pests that need to be removed there's a construction that's causing some appeal no i'm sorry pest control is actually mosquito control oh mosquito so it's a hundred percent the mosquito control program melrose is part of east middlesex mosquito control project which i think we're up to 24 communities 24 contiguous communities in eastern massachusetts Melrose pays, actually considering the size of the community, a very small amount, much less than actually what we need. It's been level funded, essentially level funded for pretty much since I've gotten here. So we actually don't have enough funding to, one of the programs we do is we larvicide catch basins because some of the breeds of mosquitoes breed in the catch basins we do

▶ 56:57 it in conjunction with public works so during the summer as they do their annual cleaning of the catch basin they clean and then we come afterwards and put the briquettes in so we only do about maybe half of the catch basins we just don't have the money to do it so the budget is actually a combination of a fixed cost that each community pays and then a variable cost depending on how much services we get so we just did the aerial spraying around the pine banks area we do hand spraying of smaller areas during the summer we have four traps set up for mosquitoes that we check for both essentially both quantity and quality so that we're looking at how many mosquitoes they're there but also what kind of mosquitoes because different

▶ 57:48 mosquitoes can carry diseases and some can't and we also test the mosquitoes for West Nile virus and eastern equine encephalitis thank you for that information but I was what I was thinking about was we got a few correspondence and emails about some rats running around the city I mean now like the animal rats is there an issue with that yes not unlike a lot of the other communities around us we two years ago when we had a big issue we had a community meeting and we're scheduling another community meeting for I'm hoping for June we're in the process of working with EHS from Norwood which is who came the last time and who I just saw yesterday at a meeting so we're just working on setting up a date and a time it'll be in the evening so people can

▶ 58:44 Monica C. Medeiros: come after work so sounds like you have it under control that's appreciated thank you all right thank you thank you thank you it's just to keep on the subject of pests I guess okay is either since we don't have you know besides the mosquitoes we don't have a specific line item relative to other kinds of pests are there resources for the public or anything like that on the website about what they can do to help reduce yes actually we do have information on the website and we're actually I have an intern this summer college intern we're gonna be revamping our part of the website just honestly haven't had the time to do it although it's been on my my list of things to do but with this intern we're gonna really beef up the

▶ 59:40 Monica C. Medeiros: website with a lot of different things including food safety and things but another part is the mosquitoes and ticks and we've been doing some tick education around the community and we go to local events and distribute a lot of of information and we have information online and actually so would you say that you know if if they were maybe retired nurses or certain professions that might be out there who might be looking to do tax work off that this particular need you might have and we have somebody in our office on the tax work off program same person every year that's good and now you do all the inspections for for restaurants and the like as well is there any program in place to kind of address how dumpsters are kept and making sure that they're

▶ 1:00:41 closed and making sure that we don't proliferate I know we've had some warm winters which have led to you know a lot of small animals out there is there any kind of program in place to address that well we have we do we do ongoing inspections for the restaurants as we do our restaurants and the rest of it is done on a complaint basis and there and we do respond when there are complaints and their dumpsters lids are supposed to be kept yes dumpster lids are supposed to be not overflowing and their lids are closed but I do gonna take this opportunity to educate everybody in the public that dumpsters are not designed to be rodent proof and I borrow your pencil for a second mice and rats if you can stick a pencil through the hole they can get through

▶ 1:01:42 Monica C. Medeiros: and if you've looked at dumpsters you probably have seen some kind of a gap around they're not really designed to make sure a mouse or a rat can't get in they will so it needs to be emptied regularly it needs to be kept clean certainly not overflowing and things next to it and that would be the same for at home and cracks and things like that whether it's in your house or your own trash especially if you have a party to keep this in mind right I know it's party time your pencil down my mouse prop those are the guests that we don't want at the party the other question i wanted to ask you a little bit about is the emergency management and this is going to come up again i know in our our next budget but and so it's to some degree it's more

▶ 1:02:40 Monica C. Medeiros: appropriate there but uh i see that your title and the salary chart has changed to health director and emergency management my direct my title is the same emergency management work has been incorporated into the job description and that's where and there there is a stipend a separate budget oh there's a stipend for me yes yes that's in this health health insurance, health budget, not health insurance, but health budget. And just, I did make some, again, I'll bring this up at emergency management, but I did make some comments to the mayor's office that I think that that would be more appropriate to move that stipend back into the emergency management budget. So it's a little bit more transparent, but.

▶ 1:03:29 I think if you remember the discussion when we were talking about emergency management the previous Alderman meeting, there's the issue with the state law that you can't be paid out of more than one budget. And that's why things are structured the way they are and the duties were incorporated into the health director position, as opposed to having a separate emergency management director title. Although I am the EMD functionally, the title stays the same and i is that specific to that i know we have some other staff members that are well you could paid out of you know partially out of grants grants that's different um i think technically in you should certainly bring this up with the city solicitor but i believe you can

▶ 1:04:24 Monica C. Medeiros: designate me a special employee but i think the will of the board at the time was to kind of make it simple and just put it all together that way you can change your mind if you want yeah i think that actually comes from the uh the mayor's office so um but thank you and then do you have just any kind of update on uh marijuana that's also uh coming fast and furiously and have you had any as the law has changed and allowed for recreational marijuana and some home growth does the department get involved at all in doing any inspections or have you had complaints so we are i am trying to stay educated on the subject which of course changes a lot and the board has we've discussed it at some board meetings as far as garden remedies go the

▶ 1:05:22 medical marijuana facility under state law we don't inspect it only the state inspects it and the edibles even though their edibles are technically technically not considered food and so again we don't inspect them as part of the food code that was all laid out as part of the state laws and regulations as far and but our when the board updated our smoking slash vaping regulations it's not specific to only tobacco and nicotine it does say in the places that you're not allowed to smoke or vape you're not allowed to smoke or vape any substance so that parts already covered and that's been somewhat recently updated is that yes yes it gets updated pretty frequently the last few years the last time we updated it was to if you remember when the city of Boston updated

▶ 1:06:31 Shawn M. MacMaster: theirs to include all parks including Fenway Park and we did the same thing because as it turns out there's actually one park in the city that technically is not owned by the city or the school department and we wanted to um include them so thank you that might have been the last thank you alderman mcmaster thank you madam chair thank you all for being here um under the contractual section of your budget i just had a few questions about interface as i understand it interface is a referral service for residents who may need a different types of mental health or wellness assistance is that correct thank you for the opportunity for me to advertise the services that the city offers interface is a program that

▶ 1:07:27 the city contracts with for twelve thousand five hundred dollars that's the line item that's in my budget it's a program run from william james college Between 50 and 60 communities in the state are part of this project. We are in our second year. We started January 1st, 2017, and I can't even say enough about what a fabulous service it is that's offered to the residents. So basically, if you have any kind of issue related to the very most broad sense of mental health, whether it's anxiety or stress or a difficult divorce or substance use within you or your family, really for most of us, the first and biggest issue, and Dr. DiPietro can really talk to this since this is what he does for a living access and

▶ 1:08:35 where to begin for most people is really and I'm sorry and dr. branch arrow is a family practitioner also is well versed in this but the the initial hurdle is where do I begin and how do I even start where do I look for a practitioner and And if you call your family practitioner, you know, they're not experts on all the different people who are out there and who takes what insurance and who's on public transportation and who has women and who has men and blah, blah, blah. And certainly we get a lot of referrals from the school department. Again, the school adjustment counselors just don't have that kind of time. It's hours of time to be able to research this. So, William James College, which is a college of psychologists, and social workers or just

▶ 1:09:31 psychologists? Psychologists. Psychologists. Has put together this program and they have a live database of over 50,000 practitioners in the areas of the communities that contract with them. And so, if you, anybody who in the community can call their 800 number Monday through Friday nine to five and explain that I'm going through a bad divorce and it's a nasty child custody battle and I really need some help in trying to sort things out and how to deal with all this and I have this kind of insurance and I work full-time so I'm only available at nights or weekends and I need to get by public transportation and I don't want to be in Melrose I want to go to somebody outside of Melrose so I won't run into anybody I know and they take

▶ 1:10:20 down all that information and they call you back in two weeks with usually three names of practitioners who can who are taking patients and can meet your needs you make your own appointment and then but they will call you back after a few weeks to check in on you to say so did you make that appointment and if not you know was there a legitimate now is there a problem or do we just need to give you little push to make that appointment or was there a problem with who we gave you like they don't take new patients anymore and we didn't know that or we didn't know they stopped taking your insurance they update their database they stay with you so the people who we've talked to who have used it they've

▶ 1:11:07 talked to have contacted us there's been some posts actually on the community page of people who have used it and said that it's been a fantastic service the first year we had about 76 people who used it primarily through through the school department referrals for the school department I'm really trying to get the word out to other populations so that it's you know a little broader you know I think if you're young and you're old there are certain there's lots of certain resources but if you're in between like like me it's harder to reach that population so trying to work with like hairdressers and nail salons and barber shops people that kind of get to know their clients have good relationships we've been passing out the cards information is on the website and

▶ 1:12:06 Shawn M. MacMaster: and I believe also on the home page for the city, too. And then we try to put something out in the blog, the mayor's blog, a couple of times a year, especially during the holidays, so. I think the concept is terrific, and I think for individuals who are battling a substance use disorder, what we know is, you know, a person in the throes of addiction, and addiction is a disease of disorganization, can expect those individuals to navigate the behavioral health system we've also seen a rise as you know in youth suicides we're starting to see a rise also in suicides among middle-aged men so I do think a service like this is particularly important in this day and age you mentioned that we're in the

▶ 1:12:55 Shawn M. MacMaster: second year of the contract what is the total time period for the contract well Well, we renew it year to year, and we started in January, but we're trying to get onto a fiscal year, kind of, just for financial aid, so. Is there an increased rate for subsequent years? I see for last year, the budget's been, it looks like $12,500 for FY19 and $6,250 for 2018. Well, because we started in January, there was six months of one fiscal year, and now we're in a whole fiscal year. Okay. So we're trying to get back onto the fiscal year budget concept, but it has not been raised in last year to this year, it's the same. Okay. Through the contract, is there any mechanism for measuring client outcomes? I do not get client, well, I get data every six months.

▶ 1:13:53 Shawn M. MacMaster: The data is broken into how many people, male, female, age groups, and how they learned about it, how they accessed it, and what the primary issue was, which consistent with our other communities is stress and anxiety is our number one issue. Are patient satisfaction surveys part of the contract? And if not, is that something that could be incorporated in if we were to renew the contract when it expires? I can ask about that. And I just had a question also about Riverside. Can you talk a little bit? I'm familiar with Riverside as a program, but in terms of what's budgeted for Riverside, what specifically is that money being used for? So the Riverside line item for the public, Riverside Community Cares is a regional outpatient

▶ 1:14:56 mental health company, organization, agency that includes Melrose. This is my 22nd budget. That line item is exactly the same as it was 22 years ago. is really a token really a token amount of money a good faith gesture to help pay for free care that that riverside provides and every year in our annual report it includes how many clients they saw from melrose how many visits total visits and the amount of free care that they provided which is always in the tens of thousands of dollars so um and actually a couple years ago i don't know maybe peter or bob will remember we had them come to the board of alderman and do a brief 10 15 minute presentation about the services that they offer and i mean

▶ 1:16:06 Shawn M. MacMaster: there's a lot of new members of the board of alderman i don't think it would be a bad thing if you know we have a light agenda if you want to we can invite them and emarc we did it for both to come and give a short presentation on on the services that they offer are considerable I think that would be that would be very helpful so when you talk about free care are these for residents who are indigent or for services that perhaps could not be billed to Medicaid, like psychoeducational programs or something of that effect? Both. Okay. I mean, when you break down the cost, it seems well worth it for, I believe your budget narrative said that 254 people have been served, 4,382 outpatient visits,

▶ 1:16:58 Shawn M. MacMaster: so that's about $24.50 per unit cost, which I think is remarkable. It's a bit higher for EMARC. My guess is that even though there are less clients receiving services through that program, are they- It's a different kind of service. More challenging services based on the, or more challenging needs based on the population of those clients? It's a completely different model. So Riverside, you're doing an outpatient 50 minute visit and I don't know Joe how many visits does insurance even allow anymore depends on the diagnosis usually 12 to 25 or so as opposed to an EMART client who's receiving services year-round because it's a permanent issue for them so that I believe also in the Recreation Department's budget did you already do

▶ 1:17:57 recreation I believe there's a line item in their budget also also for Riverside I mean for Emark sorry for Emark that because they do provide recreation opportunities for special needs adults and children so for the referrals to Riverside and Emark are these coming from municipal departments that may be interacting with the public we don't not normally emark are those are families that usually they've been involved with for many many many years and Riverside is usually referral as to the way anybody else would get a referral for a therapist so it could be through their primary care or well thank you I think I think your budget narrative is very comprehensive and I think the services that you're providing

▶ 1:19:00 are a real service to our community, so thank you. You're providing it through the funding. Motion to move the bottom line on this budget, Madam Chair. Second. Motion to move the bottom line is made by Alderman Mortimer, seconded by Alderman Boycelle on discussion. Couple of questions here. Could you explain what the sharps kiosk is? Sure, another awesome opportunity, thank you. So, several years ago, the state banned sharps, which means needles, syringes, lancets, if you're checking your blood sugar, from the waste stream. You know, like first you couldn't put paper in, then you couldn't put leaves in, and then at one point you couldn't put your sharps in. And at that time they had a grant program that we participated

▶ 1:19:50 in to get a free kiosk so it looks like a looks like a mailbox and it's outside the door of the Health Department and people can bring their sharps in a hard container doesn't have to be one of those red sharps container it can be in a detergent bottle or whatever else you have that's a hard surface and taped clothes and then the line item you see is the cost to have it picked up and disposed of and at this time we have pickups twice a month which at this time seems to be just the right amount it's primarily actually we have a lot of people whose pets are on injectables and of course people with diabetes and fertility treatments thank you you note in your memo that the professional services line item primarily pays for substitute school nurses that quote has

▶ 1:20:55 resulted in elementary schools with no school nurse can you explain that sure traditionally we've had a difficult time getting substitute nurses for our schools and the primary reason really is the pay that we give them so we've been paying $20 an hour for registered you know for an RN which is not competitive it's not competitive with the communities around us we we actually have a nurse retiring the end of the school year and I said I don't know just of off the cuff i hope you'll you know come and be a sub for us and she said uh no thank you saugus pays 35 an hour and you pay 20 an hour i said okay i i can't blame you for that so i did talk to the mayor i've talked to the mayors every year for the past 22 years but

▶ 1:22:03 But this year in particular, we just couldn't get subs, and it involved us moving nurses around to schools that had kids with severe medical needs that absolutely needed a nurse there during the day because of their IEPs and their safety. So that meant that in elementary school, never the middle or high school, there are priority and people go there first but it has resulted primarily in Horace Mann and sometimes Winthrop to not have a nurse there during the day and it's it's not okay but when I was having my budget review with the mayor this year and I pointed it out she approved increasing the rate of pay to $30 an hour effective immediately so I'm really hoping that I do feel like that will help us a lot in

▶ 1:23:13 being able to have a more robust substitute nurse list and someday when we get another nurse for the high school slash middle school which is really something that absolutely has to happen that is another layer that if for some reason there was no nurse at one of the elementary school schools that person could move over there so that we would really never be in a situation with a school with no nurse thank you thank you for that explanation finally what will happen to the tobacco coordinator position when funding for that position expires on September 30th well we reapplied it's one of those rare opportunities that we didn't get it in the first round but then again they didn't fund a lot of people in the first round and so they ended up with a pot of

▶ 1:24:15 money still there so I says the first time I've ever seen that happen so they They re-released the exact same RFR that's due next Friday, but we submitted two days ago on Tuesday, and we made some changes to the application. It's the same five communities that we applied for the first time, Melrose, Malden, Medford, Wakefield, Winchester. state has a new formula that basically required us to drop two of the communities that have been in our coalition and so if we get and if the Senate agrees and the House Ways and Means Committee the the house put an extra half a million dollars in the tobacco control budget the Senate didn't you know the process we'll see what comes out at the end so if the

▶ 1:25:19 state does get a little bit more money that would certainly help us have a better chance at getting funded but in the meantime we have we have reapplied but they haven't told us well obviously it's not due till next week I'm not sure if they're gonna be telling us I have a feeling they won't tell us until the state budget has been passed and they know really exactly how many dollars they have but they did extend our current grant that was ending June 30th to September 30th and if we don't get the grant the position ends thank you president's worker Thank You madam chair just two quick questions these are has to do with the revolving account it says that you're allowed to pay salaries through the revolving account i was just curious historically generally what salaries are paid

▶ 1:26:12 through that a couple of hours a week of the public health nurse that's it okay and then the other question is um we have you capped here for 60 000 is that adequate yes it was raised several years ago when our flu clinics really were very well attended and there was a lot of money coming through we have to buy most of the vaccine so we needed a cap that was large enough to pay for the vaccine which it uh over twenty dollars a dose you know it can get expensive so that's why the cap was raised to that we don't use that at this point but we keep it because you never know so um those are all the questions i had thank you a motion has been made and seconded to move the bottom line on the health department line item all in favor aye aye any opposed that will be moved forward

▶ 1:27:09 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: a motion to move the bottom line on the revolving account for the health department we have a motion to uh approve the revolving account second second seconded by alderman Tramontozzi on discussion all in favor all right any opposed thank you that will be approved as well and we do have one more yes our final item department number 291 emergency management in the amount of four thousand nine hundred dollars motion to move the bottom line second motion to move the bottom line by alderman boyce second by alderman mortimer would you like to speak to this uh before we go to questions sure uh well i went to my first emergency management director meeting today so that was very exciting and uh this is really a transition budget till you know

▶ 1:28:07 Monica C. Medeiros: i can kind of get my feet on the ground a little better i'm anticipating that we would spend um most of the money for training that's my hope is internal training hopefully like some drills Practice drills and things like that and I and there is a new $300 feet for us to belong to our regional emergency planning committee And that's all I know right now You can ask me whatever you want. But are there questions you may not know the answer Thank you, and mostly comments really I think you know, it's appropriate to discuss it in this so we discussed during the health budget that the there is a stipend associated with being the director of this department it's $12,500 it's included in your salary on the

▶ 1:29:00 Monica C. Medeiros: health department and the reasons outlined were that you can't you paid by more than one budget I did bring it up because I know I had been surprised when we had the discussion back only a few weeks ago about this because when we had had a some you know previous budget meetings and when I had seen the salary line item from the emergency management budget and FY 17 was zeroed out I was surprised and had asked about it and was told that it had just been eliminated not told that it went to some one else so it seemed to me that part of the discussion no you were not part of that discussion at all and not at all were you part of that discussion and so it seemed to me that it would be more appropriate to to have that in the emergency management budget if that was

▶ 1:30:03 Monica C. Medeiros: a line item in terms of you know keeping that clear and transparent perhaps it just won't be allowed to do that and that might be one of the issues that we just come across in terms of trying to comply with regulations but still you know I wish we had a way to to designate some of these things in our budget is a separate emergency management budget so I think the public knows that there's that function yes there is and it's and the budget that we're voting on right now is four thousand nine hundred dollars that is the same amount that has been there for at least the last three fiscal years I happen to have in front me um and this you know department i think is very important and i'm you know glad that it's

▶ 1:30:53 Monica C. Medeiros: getting going again and uh you know some of the things that have been done by this department in the past have been very um there were a team of uh volunteers our auxiliary team we did have an active cert team that uh for many years you know helped when we had significant flooding in the city and um you know they would help get residents out coordinate the services on on those kind of storm emergencies and off hours that you wouldn't always have regular people in and you know I think it's an important aspect for the city to be looking at especially in this day and tame time we don't know what's you know there's so many things that could happen be it a medical emergency some kind of God forbid terrorist outbreak some kind of you know real police fire emergency some

▶ 1:31:55 kind of weather dramatic event and it's important that we're prepared and I'm glad you're there manning it thank you we do have a volunteer group it's called a Medical Reserve Corps although the members are not all medical people and because really even if we did have a medical event we still need non-medical people to do parts of things like you know registration and sheltering we actually happen to be having a training this Saturday a regional big regional training for our MRC volunteers and we have a new MRC, we are part of a regional MRC with the usual suspects, Walden, Medford, Melrose, Stone and Wakefield, our public health coalition and some actually did deploy during the last group of winter storms to some of the, to

▶ 1:32:54 Monica C. Medeiros: the shelters in southern Massachusetts that needed more help and with our new MRC coordinator the goal is to really get out and do some more recruiting and a lot more training and a higher visibility so we're just ramping that up but as I said the first training for the people who are already MRC members is actually the Saturday that's great and I know I mean already as you get going this budget will probably change you know we see a dues and membership line uh item of 150 you just mentioned that 300 uh a moment ago so obviously as time you know as you get to really dig into this i imagine some of these line items will shift and we'll get a better idea of what this really costs but thank you thank you any further discussion uh i think we have a motion

▶ 1:33:49 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: made and seconded thank you um all in favor aye aye any opposed this will be moved forward to the full budget thank you very much for being here thank you very much thank you for your support madam chair would uh before i make a motion to adjourn with the proper motion at this time be to uh play order 169 on the table at the moment we have both items joined uh so we need to either separate them or deal with both concurrently they both will be staying so i believe my opinion would be that we could uh hold them both as one very good uh so i'll make a motion to lay the concurrent uh lay the joint orders on the table motion uh lay the joined orders on the table is that a second Yes, I'm sorry. Alderman Tramontozzi, thank you.

▶ 1:34:39 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: Yes, I'm sorry. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion to adjourn, Madam Chairman. Second. Motion to adjourn by Alderman Mortimer, second by Alderman Boisselle. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? We are now adjourned. Thank you. Thank you.

Original documents

• Minutes (CivicClerk PDF)
• Agenda (IQM2 PDF)
• Agenda packet (CivicClerk PDF)
• Agenda packet (IQM2 PDF)
• Other (CivicClerk PDF)
• This meeting on the city portal