Health, Education & Welfare Committee — 2020-06-18
Attendance
Jack Eccles ; Jen Grigoraitis ; Maya Jamaleddine ; Shawn M. MacMaster ; Jeff McNaught ; Leila Migliorelli
Agenda
- Call to Order
- Remote Meeting Information
- Public Comment
- Orders
- ORDER-2020-124 : Appointment of Joseph Phillips, 1 Hillside Ave., to the Human Rights Commission for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2023.
- ORDER-2020-128 : Appointment of Garin Boyd, 12 Mt. Vernon St., Unit 31, to the Commission on Disability for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2023
- ORDER-2020-129 : Appointment of Elizabeth Ryan, 17 East Highland Ave., to the Historic District Commission for a term to expire on the last day of February 2022
- ORDER-2020-125 : Reappointment of Jessica Joy Buster, 164 Derby Road, to the Commission on Women for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2023.
- ORDER-2020-126 : Reappointment of Kristina Racek Pechulis to the Commission on Women for a term to expire on the last day of February 2022.
- ORDER-2020-127 : Reappointment of C. Joseph Hunt, 132 Mt. Vernon Ave., to the Historical Commission for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2023
- Adjournment
Minutes
CITY OF MELROSE HEALTH, EDUCATION & WELFARE COMMITTEE CALENDAR● JUNE 18, 2020 Web-based remote meeting Committee Meeting 7:00 PM , Melrose, MA 02176 The public should take notice that the Melrose City Council may, on certain occasions, have a quorum in attendance due to standing committees of the City Council 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 Jack Eccles Chair Present Maya Jamaleddine Vice Chair Present Shawn M. MacMaster Voting Absent Jeff McNaught Voting Present Leila Migliorelli Voting Present Jen Grigoraitis President, ex oficio Present
ORDER-2020-124 Appointment Appointment of Joseph Phillips, 1 Hillside Ave., to the Human Rights Commission for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2023. Recommend Passage City Council
ORDER-2020-128 Appointment Appointment of Garin Boyd, 12 Mt. Vernon St., Unit 31, to the Commission on Disability for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2023 Recommend Passage City Council
ORDER-2020-129 Appointment Appointment of Elizabeth Ryan, 17 East Highland Ave., to the Historic District Commission for a term to expire on the last day of February 2022 Recommend Passage City Council
ORDER-2020-125 Appointment Reappointment of Jessica Joy Buster, 164 Derby Road, to the Commission on Women for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2023. Recommend Passage City Council
ORDER-2020-126 Appointment Reappointment of Kristina Racek Pechulis to the Commission on Women for a term to expire on the last day of February 2022. Recommend Passage City Council City of Melrose Page 1 Updated 6/22/2020 1:55 PM Minutes Health, Education & Welfare Committee June 18, 2020
ORDER-2020-127 Appointment Reappointment of C. Joseph Hunt, 132 Mt. Vernon Ave., to the Historical Commission for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2023 Recommend Passage City Council City of Melrose Page 2 Updated 6/22/2020 1:55 PM
Transcript
▶ 0:01 Jack Eccles: All right, we are recording. I just need one more minute Jack. Cool. Sorry. No worries, just tell me when. Okay. Thanks for your patience. Okay, Mr. Chairman, ready when you are. Perfect. Hi everyone. Sorry. The hour being 7-01 on June 18th, 2020. This is a meeting of the Health, Education, and Welfare Committee. I am Councilor Jack Eichel as the Chair. Joining me are Vice Chair Jamaleddine and Voting members Councilor mcnaught Councilor Migliorelli and president Grigoraitis and non-voting members Councilor thomas this notice provides a quorum for the record pursuant to governor maker's march 12 2020 order suspending provisions of the open meeting law and the governor's march 15 2020 order imposing strict
▶ 1:33 Jack Eccles: limitation on the number of people that may gather in one place this meeting of the health education welfare committee will be conducted via remote participation to the greatest extent possible we will post an audio or video recording transcript or other comprehensive record of these proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting on the city of miller's website and on mmtv3.org madam clerk will you please call the role chair eccles vice chair maladin here Councilor mcmaster Councilor mcnaught here Here. Councilor Grigoraitis. Oh, excuse me, President Grigoraitis. Okay, here. Present. Fantastic. Is there a motion to open public comment? Motion to open public comment. Second. Motion to open public comment, made by Vice Chair Jamaleddine, seconded by Councilor McNaught. Madam Clerk?
▶ 2:30 Jack Eccles: Chair Eccles. Yes. Vice Chair Jamaleddine. Yes. Councilor McMaster. Yes. Councilor McNaught? Yes. Councilor Migliorelli? Yes. President Grigoraitis? Yes. Five yes. Okay. And so all members of the public, that's not the nominees or any of the sponsors, can raise your virtual hand. I think you right-click on your name and raise your hand. If anyone's in the public, this time I would like to speak. So, I see a couple people in the public. Nobody is raising their hand. Just give it another second or two. I want to before anybody that a couple people that twice. No, 1 is raising their hand seeing no 1. is there a motion to close public comment. motion to close public comment second um awesome motion to close public comment
▶ 3:31 Jack Eccles: made by president Grigoraitis seconded by uh Councilor Migliorelli madam clerk chair eccles yes vice chair Jamaleddine yes Councilor mcmaster Councilor mcnaught yes Councilor Migliorelli yes president Grigoraitis yes five yes awesome and the first item on tonight's agenda is order 2020-124 appointment of joseph phillips phillips one hillside after the human rights commission for a three-year term said term to expire on the last day of february 2023. i think we have the mayor mike stenkovich and mr phillips himself we do i think um mr chair if you entertain a motion to suspend the rules yes motion to suspend the rules second motion to suspend the rules made by President Grigoraitis, seconded by Vice Chair Jamaleddine. Now, I'm clear.
▶ 4:25 Chair Eccles? Yes. Vice Chair Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor McMaster? Councilor McNaught? Yes. Councilor Migliorelli? Yes. President Grigoraitis? Yes. Five yes. Okay, I will bring in Mr. Staples, and I will bring in Mayor Broder, and I will find Mr. Phillips and bring him in. All right, we should be coming in at this minute. Am I up, Mr. Chairman? All right, so I think the order we've been going in is Mayor Brunner, Mike, and then the nominees. So, Mayor Brunner, if you want to kick things off. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I am pleased to be before you today. If I could take a second to do a quick shout out to the Melrose Police and Fire, as well as the faculty and staff at Melrose High School. I just had the opportunity to come back from
▶ 5:23 Paul Brodeur: The first ever in the history of Melrose rolling rally for our senior class, and I suspect based on the reaction, it is going to quickly become an annual tradition. It was very, very well done. Outstanding support from the community. That having been said, thank you for your indulgence here to offer for your consideration, Joseph Phillips for nomination to the Human Rights Commission. I know Mr. Phillips and his wife for some time and their son and they are delightful members of the community and have always been extremely engaged. You have some paperwork for Mr. Phillips before you so you know that he has a long and distinguished career in financial services including as part of his work helping minority brokers get more involved and able to advance in the business. He has also
▶ 6:15 Paul Brodeur: been uh involved with the melrose alliance against violence as a walk committee member for several years and also works um which is where volunteers for pathways of lynn as the president of their board of directors which does a lot of work with um work-related skill building and helping folks that in that way i couldn't think of a better person um to fill out the fill out the membership on the human rights commission so appreciate your consideration uh mike uh would you like to say a few words um thanks for having me um just to echo on the mayor's comments um i'm excited to have um joseph on board um i feel like we um with a lot of our department commissioners we lost some um financial expertise and as we were kind of gearing up
▶ 7:13 towards fundraising and marketing. I think Joseph fills that role very well. I've spoken to Joseph once or twice and we had a Zoom call and of all the things that we spoke about, I'm most excited that he understands the commitments to the commission and wholeheartedly accepts them and I expect him to be bringing a diverse viewpoint and I welcome his passion and his comments and his viewpoints to our commission i think he'll be a great addition thank you uh mr phelps would you like to say a few words sure thank you mr chairman um i am honored to be nominated to this position the commission here in milrose i very much look forward to participating in in helping the community at many different levels
▶ 8:14 Maya Jamaleddine: and trying to do what we can as a commission to try to others with just access and just being able to participate in this social contract that we call the United States of America and at a finer point, Melrose. I look forward to working with everyone and I'm excited to take part in this endeavor. Thank you. Thank you. Any councilors wishing to speak? Vice-Chair Zimaldi. Thank you Chairman and welcome to our virtual meeting. Mayor Bruder, Chair Stankiewicz, and Naminie Phillips, thank you so much for stepping up to this role. It's definitely a very important role in our community, and I applaud you for willing to step in and doing this. What is, I think we met once during a community forums and I was taken by your thoughts and
▶ 9:39 I appreciate the experiences that you've shared. What is one of the things that you feel you wanted to focus on improving in our community? One of the things I'd like to lend a hand to is just I think at the most basic level, it's communication and inclusion, okay? And it's just that from the outside, Melrose is kind of put-offish, right, because it's Melrose. um and you know i think that it would help help us as a community to be able to communicate to people within the community and people outside of the community that we're approachable we are welcoming and that you know we're a community that wants to be inclusive so that would be one of the one of my focuses That's a great thing to do, and I think we definitely need it in our community.
▶ 10:50 What is one of the ideas that you feel we can accomplish this? One of the ideas that I think that would help us to accomplish this would be to just, as we do, as I've seen as being part of the MAVE committee, is that we get involved in the community. okay to have meetings and and to uh facilitate ideas and stuff but we need to hit the ground we need to be amongst the people that we're hoping to impact we can't just do it from afar you have to be on the ground true i agree with you thank you so much and good luck thank you uh councilman thank you chairman um thank you mr phillips um for coming i'm i'm happy that you're taking this next step and getting more involved in the community. I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Phillips
▶ 11:48 Jeff McNaught: while door knocking during the campaign and I'm glad you were able to attend the event. I think that you met Councilor Jamaleddine at and I know the Human Rights Commission was a valuable experience for me and I'm hoping it'll be the same for you. So I look forward to approving your nomination. Thank you. Thank you. Councilor McNaught. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Chair Stankovich. And Mr. Phillips, thank you for being here. I just want to say I wholeheartedly endorse you. I think Mr. Mayor and Mrs. Stankovich and the Commission have made a fine choice in you. And I echo Councilor Jamaleddine words. I met you at the same event that she referred to in the summer and was equally as impressed as she was. So I look forward to supporting your candidacy for the Commission.
▶ 12:43 Jack Eccles: thank you thank you I'll just echo the words of my fellow councillors and with that make a motion to recommend for passage second motion to recommend for passage from President Gareda seconded by Vice Chair Jamaleddine Madam Clerk you're on mute Chair Eccles yes Vice Chair Jamaleddine yes Councilor McMaster? Councilor McNaught? Yes. Councilor Migliorelli? Yes. President Grigoraitis? Yes. Five yes. Congratulations Mr. Phillips. Thank you Mr. Segevich for being here and Mr. Mayor I think you're sticking around for a little bit. Thank you both I will make you attendees. The next item on our agenda is Order 2020-128 appointment of garen boyd 12 mount vernon street unit 31 the commission on disability for a three-year term said term to
▶ 13:48 Paul Brodeur: back around the last day of february 2023 so mr boyd i'm only going to be able to unmute you for whatever reason making panelists just grayed out so i'm going to leave you now ask can you hear us uh yes i can can you hear me i can can you all hear him i can okay mr boyd you don't have an option to make uh no we'll go with that sorry Mayor, would you like to lead off? I would. I'm sure many, if not all of you are familiar with Karen Boyd. He has been involved in any number of issues in the community through various groups related to social justice endeavors. I think, but I'm not sure, that I met Mr. Boyd the first time when I was in the legislature and there was a lot of interest in our community
▶ 14:36 Paul Brodeur: about reinvigorating connections between our MEDCO families and the city and our community. And that is only a small sliver of Mr. Boyd's involvement in the community. He is, as I'm sure he will tell you, he is vision impaired. And one of the things that is intriguing about his candidacy is the recognition that with, you'll see it in his letter with assistive technology and the ability to access public transportation, he has had a long successful career. And that is a very important part of my vision and the community's vision, I think, for how to engage in issues around disability in terms of being able to be active in the workforce. So with that said, I turn it over to Mr. Boyd for his thoughts and urge favorable consideration of the nominations.
▶ 15:37 Thank you Mayor Broder and thank you City Council for hearing my nomination. I have been living in Melrose for about six years. I've done most of my work out of the Melrose Unitarian Universalist Church. I've been involved very deeply with racial justice and social justice out of the church. I have not had the opportunity to get involved with advocacy for persons with disabilities and that is an area that i'd really like to explore and i'm very excited that melrose is having a a commission on disability and i would very much like to be a part of it thank you thank you Councilor to speak vice chair gemali thank you chairman um mr boyd i'm very pleased to see you uh stepping into this role i think if we're gonna count uh um
▶ 16:39 Maya Jamaleddine: the events and your experiences and the moments that you stepped in to help and to advocate for others, it's countless. And we all appreciate your work in our community and beyond. Thank you so much for stepping in and looking forward to see what else you're going to accomplish. And please let us know if we can help you in anything. you thank you mr. chairman again thank you mr. mayor and thank you mr. Boyd for being here I think this is again another fine choice before us this evening I appreciated reading your background your letter very much and I think that you bring both the professional and personal experiences required to help us on this new commission that I think we're all very proud to have so thank you thank
▶ 17:38 Jen Grigoraitis: Thank you, Councilor. I'll just echo my fellow councillors and thank you, Mr. Boyd, for applying. This is a new commission, so I'm sure it'll have a little bit of time to kind of get going, but I can't think of a better person to get involved. You are definitely, you know, I've met you at many events and I know you're dedicated, so I think this is a great fit. Thank you. Thank you, Councilor. I will echo the words of my fellow counselors and say, thank you so much for stepping up to this challenge of helping us bring disability rights into the forefront of this of the conversation in Melrose and to have your social justice viewpoint added on top of that is going to be so critical. So I am grateful to you for being willing to take this on and I make a motion to recommend
▶ 18:31 Jack Eccles: for passage. Second. Motion to recommend for passage by President Grigoraitis, seconded by Vice Chair Jamaleddine. Madam Clerk? Chair Eccles? Yes. Vice Chair Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor McMaster? Yes. Councilor McNaught? Yes. Councilor Migliorelli? Yes. President Grigoraitis? Yes. Five yes. Congratulations, Mr. Boyd. Thanks so much for coming tonight. Thank you, sir. Thank you for your time and consideration. Next item on our agenda is order 2020-129 appointment of elizabeth ryan 17 east highland ave to the historic district commission for term to expire on the last day of february 2022. is this with us with us i just brought her into the room outstanding thank you mr chairman again for the opportunity to speak on behalf of what i think is another outstanding nominee
▶ 19:27 Paul Brodeur: i have not known uh mrs smith as long as i've known the other two nominees however I did get to know her and was impressed with her range of skills as we started to grapple with how to do the reopening of Main Street. And she stepped forward very quickly into the fray and brought her professional knowledge to bear. She has done work in a lot of commercial space, in particular Assembly Row. and her ability to work together with the team is one of the things that struck me right away, as well as her incredible thoughtfulness and knowledge about what can work in terms of placemaking and doing some of the things that we can do to continue the theme of Main Street and to open it up a little bit and make it thrive.
▶ 20:19 So I'm very excited to offer her name and denomination for the Historic District Commission. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Ms. Ryan, if you have anything you'd like to say before we turn it over to the councillors. Can you hear me? Yep. Okay. Sorry about that. Well, thank you, Mr. Mayor, councillors. I appreciate the consideration. As the mayor mentioned, I've lived in Melrose since 2017, but I grew up in the area, so I'm very familiar with how Melrose has evolved over the last many years. but on a more professional level, I've worked in the retail real estate industry for almost 20 years now. And because of that, I've had the benefit of working with some of the best real estate developers, architects, and designers in the business.
▶ 21:11 My background includes everything from leasing traditional grocery and shopping centers to establishing and executing retail merchandising strategies for new large ground-up developments in downtown districts having worked on the development side of the business for so long it's allowed me to be directly involved with the decision-making process from start to finish with our individual tenants and also the local jurisdictions whether it be you know working with their construction teams overseeing their retail fit outs reviewing and approving storefront and signage packages and on a more personal level working directly with the tenants to ensure that their vision and strategy aligns with the the mission and strategy for the community in which their business is located
▶ 21:54 Jeff McNaught: so i look forward to sharing and utilizing a lot of my experiences uh to ensure that the historic district of melrose honors its past while evolving in a tasteful manner thank you for your consideration thank you mr chair and again thank you mr mayor and thank you ms ryan for being here mr mayor you're you're on a roll tonight this is another fantastic choice and not only that but a ward two resident um nice uh we're neighbors miss ryan so um it's great i know i know that uh each counselor um you know uh gets excited when we get somebody as as talented as you are bringing their their skills and experiences to these commissions and committees and very lucky certainly to have you with your background working in the historical district commission so as your neighbor i just
▶ 22:53 Jen Grigoraitis: wanted to say well welcome home and thank you for stepping up appreciate that thank you thank you mr chairman and thank you ms ryan and mr mayor for being here i just will echo i've I've had the opportunity to work with you on the Small Business Task Force, and I so admire how you have lent your expertise and your compassion and your time to this community in what I can only imagine is an incredibly busy time for you in your professional life. So thank you for that. And I will echo Councilor McNaught that I'm very excited to have you do this. And while you may live in Ward 2, the majority of the historic district commission is in Ward 6, so I'm gonna claim you a little bit as Ward 6 as well.
▶ 23:36 Jack Eccles: So thank you, and I look forward supporting your nomination thank you um any counselors who speak or what is the will of the committee uh bicycle drawing motion to recommend second uh motion to recommend for passage made by vice chair demolition seconded by council mcnaught madam court chair eccles yes vice chair demolition yes so mcmaster Councilor mcnaught yes councilman McGlee-Rowley? Yes. President Grigoraitis? Yes. Five yes. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Ryan. Thank you, Ms. Ryan. Thank you. The next item on our agenda is Order 2020-125, reappointment of Jessica Boy Buster, 164 Derby Road, to the Commission on Women for a three-year term, set to expire on the last day of February 2023. Do we have the mayor anymore? What is the,
▶ 24:43 Jack Eccles: any discussion or what is the will of the committee no she's gonna say mr. chairman I just I think I got confused because where it's a reappointment I don't think we have anyone before us that right so I'll step back and councilman Jamal Dean make her motion apologies like to make a motion to recommend second motion to recommend for passage made by vice chair de maledine seconded by councilman Migliorelli madam clerk chair eccles yes vice chair de maledine yes mcmaster Councilor mcnaught yes councilman Migliorelli i think it's something i guess jim's uh awesome order 2020-126 reappointment of christina raysek fuchilis to the commission on women for a term of or for a term to expire on the last day of february 2023. uh councilman uh thank you mr chairman i just
▶ 26:03 Jack Eccles: wanted to say i know this is another reappointment but i just wanted to give another air high five to another ward 2 resident and make a motion to recommend for passage Okay, motion to recommend for passage made by Councilor McNaught, seconded by President Grigoraitis. Madam Clerk? Chair Eccles? Yes. Vice Chair Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor McMaster? Councilor McNaught? Yes. Councilor Migliorelli? Yes. President Grigoraitis? Yes. five yes the final item on our agenda tonight order 2020-127 reappointment of c joseph hunt 132 mount vernon ave to the historical commission for a three-year term said to expire on the last day of february 2023. i just didn't know if this i believe this is a resident of ward seven i didn't know
▶ 27:06 if counselor thomas wanted to say anything i've not i don't want to assume either way for my second motion recommend me by Vice Chair Jamaleddine seconded by Councilor Migliorelli Madam Clerk Chair Eccles yes Vice Chair Jamaleddine yes Councilor McMaster Councilor McNaught yes Councilor Migliorelli yes President Grigoraitis five yes there's a lot of M's tonight that is the final item on agenda is there a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn second to adjourn made by Councilor Migliorelli seconded by Councilor mcnaught madam clerk chair eccles yes mr maladin yes Councilor mcmaster Councilor mcnaught yes Councilor Migliorelli yes president Grigoraitis yes Bye everyone in attendance. Bye guys.
▶ 28:17 See you later. Bye.