Public Service Committee — 2023-07-13
Attendance
Christopher Cinella ; Mark Garipay ; Jen Grigoraitis ; Manjula Karamcheti ; Shawn M. MacMaster ; Robb Stewart
Agenda
- Call to Order
- Public Comment
- Appointments/Reappointments
- APPT-2023-19 : Appointment of Andrea Dorian Rose, 51 Albion St, Apt. 9, to the Melrose Conservation Commission as an Associate Member for a two-year term set to expire on the last day of February 2025.
- APPT-2023-20 : Reappointment of William Gardiner, 45 Boardman Ave., to the Melrose Parks Commission, for a one-year term set to expire on the First Monday of May 2024.
- Adjournment
Minutes
CITY OF MELROSE PUBLIC SERVICE COMMITTEE CALENDAR● JULY 13, 2023 Council Chamber, First Floor, Melrose City Hall Committee Meeting 7:00 PM 562 Main Street, 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 Robb Stewart Chair Present Christopher Cinella Vice Chair Absent Mark Garipay Absent Manjula Karamcheti Present Shawn M. MacMaster Absent Jen Grigoraitis President, Ex Oficio Present
APPT-2023-19 Appointment Appointment of Andrea Dorian Rose, 51 Albion St, Apt. 9, to the Melrose Conservation Commission as an Associate Member for a two-year term set to expire on the last day of February 2025. Ought to Pass City Council
APPT-2023-20 Appointment Reappointment of William Gardiner, 45 Boardman Ave., to the Melrose Parks Commission, for a one-year term set to expire on the First Monday of May 2024. Ought to Pass City Council City of Melrose Page 1 7/20/2023 10:40 AM
Transcript
▶ 0:03 Robb Stewart: Okay, good evening. Um, this is, uh, the meeting of the Public Service Committee. I'm Counselors Stewart, the chair of this committee. Joining me are, uh, counselors Carm Chetty, and, uh, president Exofficio Grigoraitis. Um, this in, in Lou roll call. This establishes a quorum for the meeting, um, and in accordance with the open meeting law. This meeting is being recorded and broadcast on our local cable access channel, MMT V as well as live streamed on the MMT V website and is available for future viewing through the City of Melrose's meeting portal. So, at this time, without, uh, uh, uh, objection, I will do, yeah. Without objection, I will open the floor for public comment. This is a portion of the meeting where anyone can come forward to speak on the
▶ 1:01 Robb Stewart: matters. On the agenda before us, do we have anybody in line? Uh, not at the moment. And it looks like no one here is interested in public comment. So at this time without objection, I will close public comment, uh, seeing that we have, uh, the mayor here, I think, who is going to be speaking on behalf of one of the appointees. Uh, without objection, I will, uh, make a motion to suspend the rules. The rules are now suspended. The first order on our agenda is appointment number 2023 dash 19, and this is the appointment of Ms. Andrea Dorian Rose of 51 Albion Street, apartment nine, to the Melrose Conservation Committee as an associate member for two year term set to expire on the last day of February, 2025. So,
▶ 1:51 Paul Brodeur: Mr. Mayor, Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. Um, I'm before you tonight. As, um, the chairman said to talk about the appointment of Ms. Rose, and I say this probably just about every time I come before you to talk about an appointment and that you gotta look at the resume. It's really unbelievable. Um, and it is demonstrably true in this case. So, what the, for folks that don't know, um, what the Conservation Commission does principally is enforce the Massachusetts Wetlands Protection Act, but it also does, um, varies little bit from community to community advocacy work, um, care and attention to conservation lands and other natural resources in the community, um, in particular in, in, in this case to a certain degree,
▶ 2:43 Paul Brodeur: LP Pond. Um, so Ms. Rose has, uh, an extensive background, uh, including a master's in biology, and she's in another's master's program, uh, right now devoted to this idea of, um, environmental studies with a particular concentration in conservation biology. Uh, she has a particular focus, if you do have a chance to read, uh, her resume, uh, guness, I would say, or anthology, which I think is the study of birds. But I really don't want to, um, sometimes you can say study of bugs. When you mean study of words, I don't really go. So, um, the, the, you know, that piece of, of our environment. Um, and, uh, if, if you're not familiar with El Pond and certainly other places in the city, um, you would, you would learn pretty quickly that we have a quite a diverse, um,
▶ 3:40 Paul Brodeur: uh, collection or representation of, uh, flora and fauna, particularly, um, more, more bird species than you, than you may expect if you don't have a chance to do that kind of thing. Uh, so without much further ado, I'm gonna turn it over to the expert, Ms. Wood, so she can talk about, uh, her com, her qualifications in more detail. Is that me? Can you hear me Loud and clear? You can hear me. I'm having a little bit of trouble. You're hearing me okay? We hear you great. Yes. Great. First of all, I would like to thank the committee and Chair Stewart, in particular for suspending the rules. Um, I apologize that I am out of the country today and unable to attend in person. Um, I, I am actually currently working on my first master's of Science in conservation,
▶ 4:38 um, biology. And I have been living in Melrose for about six years, since 2017. I was attracted to move to Melrose. Uh, I was living in Boston and I was returning back to school at Tufts, and I wanted to be closer to my campus, but I wanted to be somewhere with a lot of green space and a town or city that has in mind for, um, basically conservation in general. And that's what attracted me to move to Melrose. And I have been working at the Conservation committee and wishing to serve Melrose with my knowledge and my, um, background in the best way possible. And I thought that, um, working with the conservation committee would be a way to do that. And I realize, and I'm very aware that its primary focus is on the Wetland
▶ 5:36 Protection Act and upholding that. Um, and that's great. Um, and then of course, advocacy is important to me. So I feel like I have, um, I, I can serve in a positive way, and I would, you know, I know that I also don't have an official vote, but I am there to, um, have conversations and help inform decision making. Thank you, Ms. Rose. Uh, any questions from the committee? Councilor Che? I'm not sure where to look. Um, first, I just wanted to say thank you so much for being here, and given that you're out of the country and still joining us, that is a sign to me that you are dedicated and interested and really wanna serve. So thank you for that. Um, as someone who just recently got to kayak in El Pond,
▶ 6:39 Manjula Karamcheti: I would love to just sort of get your take on, and I don't expect you to have like an agenda or anything, but what are some of the things that you're excited to be in involved in regarding the Conservation Commission and Melrose? And thinking about, um, how do we move forward together in terms of developing our city and opportunities, but also being very careful, um, about our environment and, and supporting and, um, making sure that we're doing the right things. Thank you for that. Uh, I'm really very excited about, first of all, I am a, I have a research trajectory at my university, and I feel that especially research and conservation needs to be informed and directly dovetailing with action.
▶ 7:30 That's really what's important to me. So even though I have a research trajectory, you always wanna see, um, that it's serving directly something that's useful. And what I'm really excited about with Melrose is it has such a green space, but it's also growing. So it's really going to be, um, important to see how you can, um, meet the needs of people and our housing, but also to kinda educate and advocate for, um, really treasuring what we have in Mel Roads. LP Pond is fantastic. It really is a place where workers like it is a, a migratory, um, stopover for a lot of birds. So, um, a lot of people might not see that activity because birds are really good at hiding, but it's not just the birds. It's, um, they're good indicators,
▶ 8:20 species for the health of the environment, and, um, ALP Pond's doing, um, as far as they can see, really, really great. Um, right now in the meetings that I've been attending, um, I have been learning and, um, hopefully contributing to the discussion about how to maintain our bonds. So there's not just the maintenance, but there's also public outreach. You can't conserve what you don't love or have no, uh, not a lot of information about. And so I would be excited to do something that could be like that. I'm not sure if that really is exactly what would happen with the conservation committee, but I would be very interested in doing that. Um, outreach that is, um, to, and I think a lot of times people don't understand why
▶ 9:09 Manjula Karamcheti: things are done for the long term view, and, uh, I think that's a good thing to educate people on. Um, so I guess that's a lot of answers, but yeah, I'm really excited to work with the committee, and I think it's a very important time, um, for the growth and all this. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. And I'd love that quote. We, we can't preserve what we don't love. I really appreciate that. And I may be quoting you on, on that one somewhere down the line. I really, I really like that. Thank you. Thank you, counselor. What it President Grigoraitis? Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, I will just echo the comments of my colleague. Thank you for putting your name forward and for your willingness to lend your
▶ 9:57 Robb Stewart: expertise to your community. I'm really excited to have you join the con com. And with that, I'll make a motion to recommend for passage. Second. Okay. So we have a motion to recommend made by President Grigoraitis, seconded by Councillor Chetty on discussion. Okay, Mr. Clerk Councillor Carcetti. Yes. President Dees? Yes. And yours to It? Yes. That's three. Yes. Unanimous. All right, Ms. Rose, thank you. This will go to full committee, um, full counsel, uh, for the final vote. You don't need to be there. Um, but, uh, we'll bring this forward, your information. So thank you for being here tonight. Mr. Chairman, before you, before you, um, entertain a motion to adjourn, if I may, We actually have another,
▶ 10:39 Paul Brodeur: It's a little piece related to, um, We have another order, uh, Mr. Mayor, oh, well, I'll throw it in there, but go ahead, please. So, um, in El Pond News, I've probably seen the, I'll call them harvesters out on the pond. Uh, that is season two of our effort, the, you know, supported by, um, state and local money to control the water chestnut population. And that will be an ongoing process. So a few folks have asked about that. When is that gonna start happening again? It is underway. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Appreciate that update. Okay. We have, uh, the final, uh, appointment on our agenda tonight is appointment 2023 dash 20, the reappointment of Mr. William Gardner of 45 Boardman Ave, to the Melrose Parks Commission for a one year term set to expire on the first
▶ 11:31 Robb Stewart: Monday of May, 2024. And I don't know if Mr. Gardner is here or not this evening. Uh, it's not necessary since this is a reappointment, uh, reappointment. So with that, what is the will of the committee? Madam? Uh, sorry. President Grigoraitis. Thank You, Mr. Chair. Um, I will make a motion to recommend for passage. I'm thrilled that Mr. Gardner is willing to serve yet again on the Parks Commission, which he has done with distinction for some time. Second, So we have a motion on the floor, uh, by President Grigoraitis, uh, for passage, seconded by Council Chetty. Uh, all in favor? Aye. Aye. Opposed? All. Okay. So that will be recommended for full committee, and with that, I'll entertain a motion to adjourn. So moved.