1.30.2024 City Council - Committee on Health & Environmental Affairs

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city council committee on health and environmental fails we call to order Madam clerk call the role please coun here here chairos pres pursu to the oper meeting law any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any medium attendees May are therefore advised that such recordings or Transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those

present and are deemed acknowledged and permissible item number one on the agenda today is Citizens input we have none so we'll move on to item two it's the minutes from the August 22nd 20123 meeting can I have a motion motion to approve motion to approve second made by vice president Perera second by Council Dion all in favor I any opposed it's a word all right we're going to move on to

number three it's a resolution to discuss strategies to decrease Solid Waste and Recycling costs tabled 1282 21 motion left from the table second motion made by vice president Pereira second by Vi by Council Dion all in favor I so moved gentlemen come on down if we could introduce ourselves in our titles please that would be appreciated for the committee good evening Al Ola director

of City operations and I'm Matt Thomas I'm attorney working with the city excellent number of issues thank you sir appreciate you both being here um so just for some historical reference here the resolution pretty much is looking for an update on the cost of recycling cost of trash I know in the um committee on ordinances we talk about this briefly but new committee new day so attorney

to start working with a group he was putting together to talk about Solid Waste and Recycling issues um the the costs was starting to really Skyrocket um the recycling Market is very volatile as it's been for some time now and it was time to stop looking at certain things we started out by trying to make sure that we had the data correct and so we started a process of what we called C maintenance where the

um City went out with its vendors to every house hold and uh perform maintenance on the Cs make sure the wheels were working correctly the covers were working correctly replaced what needed to be replaced and also made sure that the barcode on the side could be read this is important for us because that those barcodes together with a reader and certain software allows us to identify certain information one is it

gives us better ideas on what's being picked up secondly it gives us better ideas on where it's being picked up as to houses because each cart is assigned to a house now it's true that with certain storms windy like it was the other day carts tend to go all over the place but for the most part they pretty much stay where they were placed we were also looking to make sure that all the

cats out there should have been out there because there had been some talk that cats had been sent out um inadvertently in the past and we wanted to make sure we got control of that as well so that took us probably about six months to do they went through the entire city and we use a company called reig and reig gives us the ability to read the cats and come up with certain

data so a lot of what we decided or what was recommended to them it was based on the data that came out of that secondly at the same time the city implemented a pilot program in the North End of the city and in the South End of the city in certain neighborhoods trying to um see if we could pick up corrugated cardboard separately from the single stream so single stream recycling is definitely an

efficient way to pick it up the trouble is it leads to contaminated um recyclables uh there the contamination really impacts the corrugated cardboard where if you're putting glass in there and the glass breaks the shards of glass go into the corrugated cardboard and once that happens the value of the corrugated cardboard just plummets so we've gone through that process we've had much more success in

the North End of the city than in the South End and we're addressing that we think it's an education issue not an education of uh the education attainment by the residents but it's a recycling education information that we have have to put out in some practices and I'll talk about that in a minute because we have some ideas on what we're pushing on that but the North End showed us that by

picking it up separate and keeping it separate we were actually increasing the recycling value on it which was actually for a little bit of time helping us get rid of it at no cost almost it was a wash which hasn't happened in recycling for a long time most people think oh let's recycle glass glass is you everybody wants to recycle their glass glass is a very difficult thing to recycle because

there's really no aftermarket anymore for glass we don't really see glass bottles like we used to a lot of people are going to C to box to cardboard boxes you see that with wine now um aluminum is the best thing because it's so recyclable and the glass breaks and when the glass breaks it causes all sorts of problems and we were talking today with um a vendor um that does work for the

city elel Harvey and they were telling us down in Florida they were actually grinding the glass back into the sand from whence it came and they're going to pour it off into the ocean and they're going to see how that affects it so um when you think about it that's where glass comes from it's it's melted sand so we're looking at that and we were talking about that and we uh so that's

been going into it and then we took the information that came from this and through the information and looking at the volatility in the markets um I made the announcement last week at ordinance that as of March 1st the city will longer collect commercial Municipal Solid Waste or Recycling and there were letters that are going out by the end of this week to all of the V uh the parties that were receiving

that and we're giving them a month to basically um hire a private company we're going to give them some names of some of the local private companies and then uh that'll handle that part of it the reason with doing that is not so much for the collection side because it's a fixed price collection contract whether they pick up 30,000 bins or 40,000 bins it's the same price it's the

disposal costs and so the idea is to try to get a better handle on the disposal costs because th that's the cost that's really going out of control so that'll be happening and then that'll be as of March 1st which is a Friday that following week the city Crews will go through the city and um not the pink bins which people purchased but on the other bins they'll be recovering the bins

and bringing them back into the city or disposing of them because the the blue bins and the um the green bins are City bins but people purchased those pink bins so it'll probably take about a week to two weeks to get them all back in but they're going to do that that following week and then that'll cut down any potential of uh the city inadvertently picking up commercial solid waste so

that was the announcement for last week that's been in the the um in the uh works for some time now that's probably going to lead us to we think somewhere around maybe five to 600 maybe $500,000 in savings between um the disposal maybe about four something we're not really sure um as to the exact number but it's about $400 to $500,000 maybe less um I know that that number has been a number

that has been played out in the past multiple times as a matter of fact I think actually I'm overstating it's going to be about 150,000 I apologize I know I got the higher number from a comment you made at a meeting where you thought that it had been about we had been told about 300,000 I made that comment you made that comment I don't believe to be very Frank with with all

the respect to the past that the number was ever at that number and the reason for that is we've gone back over and we've looked at the bins based on the bin numbers and the areas that they're in and the bins are basically for solid waste you have a 35 gallon 65 gallon and a 95 gallon and on average is about about a half a pound per gallon is is

what you kind of look at in these things and we looked at the number of totes and for the disposal side using the $113 a ton which is what we pay for disposal right now there was about 4.92 tons which came out to about 28,9 A3 ballpack again these are estimates we don't have an actual we don't do a separate commercial run so we don't know exactly how much commercial garbage

there is we're estimating it based on the bins and what T people typically dispose on the recycling side um there was 8.34 tons roughly and that's at $125 a ton and that's about 54,000 so it's about 83,000 when you add in additional costs and things we may not have caught right away it's going to be about 100 to 150,000 nothing to laugh at it's a savings but the issue is the volatility

on the recycling you never know um and that's really what we're here to talk about today is the recycling there's a number of challenges on the recycling our recycling is probably more contaminated than it should be now by contamination it's not as bad as it sounds it's not hazardous waste people will dispose of pool swimming pools you know plastic swimming pools rubber hoses plastic bags

single-use plastic bags um construction debris construction debris but that other stuff stuff that's recyclable they think but we can't take it in Municipal recycling because it's either there's either no aftermarket for it or it causes a problem with the machines single-use plastic bags get stuck in the machine uh plastic flatware gets stuck in the machines so that's deemed to be contamination in a recycling batch

secondly depending on the weather and sometimes depending on Lewiston Street which is where all this goes into first it gets that there's water that gets into it and the water uh once it gets into it it will increase the weight of it and it also increases the density of it which makes it much more difficult for the for the um Machines of the recycling plants to handle it um as

we've been told they like it light and fluffy and I don't think our recycling is light and fluffy now that could happen inadvertently I know what happened with me at home the other day that rain and Windstorm we had I know there was probably about this much water in the bottom of my bin by the time I went outside to close the cover that had blown open and I wasn't going to empty

it before I had garbage in it and Recycling and one so I wasn't going to get rid of that so that adds to it the other thing too is all of our recycling goes into Lewiston Street before it goes out to the recycling facility the reason for that is we're trying to separate out some of the contamination separate out some of the solid waste that's in there because that happens too people throw in dirty

diapers they'll throw in uh Solid Waste you typically when your bin gets full Sometimes some people throw in the bag of garbage into the recycling um I I don't think it's the vast majority of the contamination I think it's all three but when the water gets into it it affects it all and so that's called contaminated recy recyclables we try to separate it at Lewiston Street using um a loader uh a

machine and and to the best that we can we'll separate it repackage it into a bin into into a 30 yard container and then that 30 yard container goes off to Rochester which is where we're disposing of it right now to elel Harvey the ultimate goal is to get to a point through education and through enforcement where they're picking it up from the street putting it on the truck and taking it directly to Rochester okay

right to New Bedford and then let them handle it in New Bedford at their facility and then we don't have to have this intermediary step to get to that point it's necessary to do a couple things which we've started putting in place first and foremost is education and the conversation that the mayor's had on education we've spoken to the school department about this because first and foremost the best way to get

to people with the education point is to start with the children uh years ago used to use and I think I mentioned the council repos we used to use the Dr Seuss book The Lorax which is about sustainability and we would do that with third and fourth grades and start having competitions on recycling in the schools and have them take home that information and they become the best enforcers of

recycling you ever saw as your kids the second thing is would be handing out information Citywide and in a targeted basis to the neighborhoods that are having issues with recycling right now we know that there are certain neighborhoods where the recycl that comes out of those neighborhoods is a little bit more contaminated than others it could be through the mix of the neighborhood could be through absentee

land lism it could be through a lot of rentals there's a whole range of reasons and not to be pejorative about this this it's people's lives but through an educational process we'll try to pick up a little bit of that as well that's the carrot part of this the the other part of it is the stick Po and so the city is going to enhance enforcement but it's not just going to roll out enforcement

tomorrow what is going to happen is there's a process and a procedure we're putting into place which will lead to a situation where there's a leaflets that'll be handed out the first week the second and third weeks maybe it'll be warning tags then by the fourth week we'll start to get into writing tickets and doing the enforcement on it we're not going to some places if it's a contaminated B uh recycling B won't pick

it up that's not something we're going to do we're not going to leave them on the streets we'll pick them up and we'll try to work our way through it with the homeowners the people who will get the citations though will be the landlords not the homeowners not the tenants there's no way to give it to the tenants it's really the landlord's responsibility through their leases with and their uh tency agreements the same

way that a landlord basically tells a tenant you're not supposed to have fireworks you're not supposed to have immoral activity going on there you're not supposed to store combustibles that you're not supposed to they have that same responsibility on making sure that they provide water to them and that they provide the bins and that the bins are used correctly so rather than let the

city get involved in the the battles on a unit byun basis and how it'll be to the landlords now I know that's going to cause some consternation on the part of some landlords um I understand it's not easy being a landlord I understand that but by the same token I think most landlords don't have a problem with this and we'll try to provide them the educational information too and the

support to get there so so really the goal is this before pay you throw and I know pay you throw was a very hly contested issue and it was not popular and the message I'm going to give you is even less popular pay you throw worked during the pay you thr years from 2014 to 2018 there were revenues coming in recycling increased and trash collection decreased okay and during those years if

you really get to into those years we came the closest that we've ever come to recycling tonnage per person and per household and solid waste tonnage per household coming very close to being the same being close to each other and one of the purposes of P you throw is to reduce tonnage and to increase Recycling and it was working when PES you stopped in 2018 the tonnage on the solid waste

started skyrocketing the tonnage on the recyclable stayed pretty much the same until Co hit and then the problem at Co was you were starting to be inundated with Boxes by Amazon by Walmart by places like that one thing that we are kicking around is maybe to try to do a pilot program with Walmart and Amazon where we do something where you're done with the boxes as they're delivering to

you they pick up your empty boxes and we try to work with them on trying to collect them and do some type of recycling on their empty boxes not if you've ever seen the facility the Amazon facility but they have a recycling a bailing facility for cardboard that's Second To None because they have cardboard that comes in and then they take the stuff out and repackage it on its way out so it's

something we're looking at but just as a frame of reference the average household in the United States produces 8 tons of garbage a year of Municipal Solid Waste 8 tons La in 2022 and this calendar year numbers in 2022 the average household in Fall River produced 920 so it's above the state above the national average it's down from where it was before pay you throw right before pay

you throw was at 1.9 1.09 tons so it has come down it's just that there were more households also there were 42,000 households being serviced so that would be like a three family would be three households were being serviced before pay you throw um now we're down to about 20 we're down to about 36,000 households so there was a reduction in households as well so from a total tonnage point of

view um in 2011 we were producing 35,9 56 tons of solid waste uh in 2022 calend the year we produced about 28,9 29 so the goal in the long run is to increase the recycling and the efforts on Rec Recycling and to have cleaner recycling through education and through Outreach um and the state is helping with with this we have um a state um liaison at Mass D that we're working with they provide recycling information

the city gets a recycling grant that we're using for this as well and so it's to increase the recycling through these efforts through education and through enforcement um and to at the same time get a better control of the costs on the solid waste and try to reduce that it will naturally be reduced by the increase in recycling but to also try to reduce that as well couple last points and then I can

answer any questions you have and I'm sure Mr oliv will as well um there's a state ban on uh textiles we're looking at working with a private sector textile company where all you have to do is call them and they'll come and pick up your textiles that you're throwing out your clothes that you can't give to Goodwill as somebody else they'll pick it up they they get they dispose of it themselves and then they provide a

rebate to the city a share of the rebate to the city so that's a way to help households do that as well um there's also possibility that they'll do that with household items as well so that's one thing we're looking at we're looking at also this food waste piece because there's a food wasteband that hasn't affected the houses yet it affects the institutions as to where it's going to go and so um there these

Anor robic digestion facilities um unfortunately for them to really work they have to be federally subsidized that's how they really work the biggest one in the area is actually owned by Stop and Shop in Freetown and that's where they're spoiled food goes back to and the idea is you take the food you you use this Anor robic digestion process which is a lack of oxygen it creates methane gas you burn the methane

gas and you produce power but in in order to get to that from a commercial situation or from a municipal situation you also need to have a depackaging plant because you have to take it out of the pack the package it's in and you need a slurrying plant an emulsifying plant to slurry it into a substance almost like a milkshake to put into the anerobic digestor for it

to do what it has to do so the city's looked at that and the thing is when looking at that um what we're finding is that the only ones that really are viable are the ones that that are federally subsidized although it's a great way also to get rid of um sludge from the solid waste treatment plant so there may be some which would be a huge savings right there may be some avoided

costs there as well so that's something that's being looked at as well that's a state initiative um the state is not allowing any new landfills right now State policy is bagot you either take it out by a truck or put it on a train to Ohio which is really not a good policy to be frank with you uh because sooner or later Ohio is goingon to say thank you very much but no more that's kind of

like I don't care where it goes as long as it's not in my neighborhood exactly yeah it's it's it's a version of nimbyism you're right so we're looking at that as well we're looking also to try to get some economies of scale in the contracts the disposal contract is up next October with Republic and uh the city is preparing right now A solicitation these are not 30 BB we're exempt from 30 be on these

but a solicitation for disposal that'll be going out in about a month to try to get into probably about a 2 to threee disposal contract you really don't want to get into anything longer than that whether you can't because of the volatility if you can get two to three years you're good we're also looking at putting out a solicitation for a recycling contract we don't really have a contract with the elve it's been a

shake of a hand for a year you know on a yearly basis um and that and they've been pretty good they they met with us they're willing to work with us at leou Street and with some other to try to increase the quality of the recycling um but by the same token we want to try to go out put a solicitation out see what we can get back see what works what doesn't work um easy disposal

is still under about two more years of contract with this that's a fixed price contract but it's about two more years two yeah 25627 it's a fixed price contract so again regardless of what they pick up or how they pick it up um when they pick it up they we pay the same price um that was a contract that had the savings it was weird how the contract was written I don't mean weird

a it was just it's a funky schedule so they they front loaded some Savings in some areas they didn't front load savings and others but easy disposal has been very good with us so far we've met with them regularly and trying to um push the situations the other thing too is we try to get a handle on the trash that comes out of the schools because the schools should be paying for

that piece that's how it happens in most municipalities they reimburse for that piece and we didn't really have a good idea on what they were disposing now we we have a much better idea and so we're working with them on that so that that gets reimbursed and you know it's a it's an important Municipal service so we understand that we've got to provide it to the residents in a way that protects

Public Health protects Public Safety and also doesn't kill City financially especially with things like Diamond Coming Down the Line and other things coming down the line the cost of Municipal solid waste collection and Diamond are roughly the same cost a year once Diamond gets to the Six Million for the debt exclus you know for the debt and um that's not a debt exclusion so that's going to have to come out of the

budget and Municipal Solid Waste is probably up around $6 to8 million in that range as well so um you know at this point I'm not suggesting that we're going to pay you throw I'm not suggesting we're doing anything other than trying to make the best we can with the vendors we have and try to educate and work with the residents um somebody had asked about what's going to happen with nonprofits

and what's going to happen with um resident residential units above five units um that's being looked at by law we don't have to pick above five on the residential units so that'll probably be addressed the nonprofits is a bigger issue because the whole idea with a nonprofit is and we're seeing this play out right now very vividly between what's happening with stward and the the concern about St

ANS so Steward produces probably about $1.3 million of tax for the city a year through all of their entities we're monitoring this very closely if they go to a nonprofit if they get sold to a nonprofit or which is better than closing it's going to have an impact on the city and so the issue is not to try to hurt the nonprofits like South Coast but to try to maybe go and negotiate with them pay

L tax where they're paying maybe 25% of what they would otherwise pay to cover some of the cost offset some of the cost of police fire um that's a negotiation though they don't have to pay it but rather than I think one of the Hallmarks of what we've done over the past year is not to rush into anything everything we're doing we're Rush PD not to rush well no I'm talking past year I

can't talk to me on the past year but one thing that I've tried to make sure is that what we're doing is data driven is reasonably thought out and that we don't rush into something or make a promise that we can't keep so if we say we're going to do it we're going to do it 10 I think we'll turn to some questions Council Dian your first please in terms of that 30 00,000 where

that number came from was way back in the beginning when we first started having discussions about the trash and I believe probably at that time they weren't separating the uh pickup and Disposal so if you look at it collect no pun intended but if you look at it collectively it would have been reasonable could so that's where that came from oh I don't mean to cast dispersions on it just I don't think it

was a realistic number yeah I just wanted to explain why and where that came from now in terms of the uh anerobic digestion with those types of of facilities that's where CG is produced Al also well no what they're producing is methane it's different than it's not it's not uh natural gas it's just the same methane quite honestly that comes from a landfill Y and the same way that a landfill captures it and

burns it to produce energy y this is the same process it's just contained in a uh a vat a sealed vat um let's see so what is the price per t now for recycle and and solid waste well there's a $225 Hall fee for the recycling so that's to pick it up every time they do and and there's probably four trucks five trucks at the 225 a day four trucks probably four

trucks and then we pay $125 a ton uh for the recyclables themselves that's on the um that's on the um recyclables the uh Municipal Solid Waste I think the contract is about 4 point something million right now for the thing so we don't really break it out because it's a fixed price it doesn't but on the disposal it's $132 a ton and that'll be the price through October um has it been have there been any

conversations in regard to the number of bins per residential property yes uh that's one of the reasons we did the bin M the cart maintenance because we've heard Tales I don't if they're Urban mits or they're true we we kind of figured out that some of it is true where um through prior administrations people would call in to get extra bins correct and we wanted to make sure that

on a single family you get one in one um 65 and a 65 if you're in a in a two family um I think you get a 95 and a 95 if you're in a three family there there's a setout path and one of the things of C maintenance is that we're going to make sure that that's what they're getting because the purpose of that having one bin and one bin is to

encourage you to not go over that bin of the municipal solid waste and again not myself my own family we do fine with it it's just my wife and I at home but when everybody's home for Christmas or everybody's home for Thanksgiving you tend to have issues and so it might take you two weeks to get rid of all your garbage um and you're storing it but for the most most part these have been set

up because to to work because on average five pounds about half a pound of garbage uh solid waste per per gallon is what it comes out to on average so in those conversations um because obviously there are families that produce more solid waste than others there might be a single family that's got six people living as opposed to two and a 65 gallon might not be sufficient in those

situations have there been conversations about if if that uh household would want a second bend that they would be able to pay for that second Bend no we haven't had that conversation and the reason for that is that is the disposal side as as horrible as this sounds payers you throw proved that if you really come right down to it the bin worked one bin would work and that was being e economically driven on the

household once we did away with p you throw the economic impact now went on to the municipality so using the same justification from a municip municipal point of view that you did from a family point of view we want to keep that disposal cost down and so initially we have not really considered the possibility of having extra bins um I think it's a matter of if you really

want to look at it if we really get to that point maybe we'd get to the point where we would open up a transfer station on a Saturday and if you had extra you could go dispose of it there mhm at the at the transfer station some towns do that some cities do that you you take your gabbage recyclables right to the transfer station and that's almost a a u safety valve but to allow

additional bins it's counterproductive the goal is to we're at 20 20 uh 29,000 tons about 29,000 tons the goal is to get to right around 20,000 tons initi and we should be able to get to that I think if the recycling goes up we get to that pretty easy y have there been any discussions um in terms of moving away from single stream recycling to reduce contamination we've had that conversation a number of times and that

was the whole idea of the pilot program the idea was maybe what we do is we go to cardboard one week uh comingled the next week um and so we've looked at that and depending on what comes back and it seems like that could be an option in the North End of the city but in the South End of the city since it's not working that doesn't seem like it would

be an option there so we're still looking at it but we have had those conversations as a lot of communities have well I guess probably part of the problem would be that we have more multifamilies in the South End than you do in the North End obviously so yeah you're going to produce more right um and really if you have one 195 gallon recycle bin in a two family um is that sufficient for the

recyclables when you're only collecting it every other week right so that's some people produce a ton no no they do no no significant amount of of recycle you're right and the other part of it too is education I mean you would tend to think wow this is plastic I can throw it out but Plastics can be numbered and it's on the recycling it's on the the the ReUse market so one thing that we're going to

go to as well is um sending out information that you can put in your house right above your garbage recycling can about this is what you can put in here and what you can't put in there and sometimes it's through good intentions that people are throwing stuff out that they think they can recycle I could be wrong but is it um above a number two you're not supposed

to put and recycle a five which is a a five is out completely and that's I mean you see these things and even at that a few years back there was this thing called China sword where the paper was a big issue so if you shred your paper paper you can't recycle shredded paper no you actually have to throw out recycled uh shredded paper mhm if you just throw the paper out it can be

recycled well with privacy concerns in folks homes they're recycling putting it into the garbage and the reason that you can't recycle it is that it gets stuck in the machine that's the reason dense it gets caught into the pieces of the machine and when that happens if from any community and it shuts down the whole line it shuts down the entire line at the processing facility in Rochester

which is where this all eventually gets processed so um that's the issue too it's it's an education thing and we're hoping that that'll do it and get that helped out a bit does the now this has this actually just you mentioned it it has nothing really to do with recycle or or um Solid Waste but is the city considering um going back to people being able to bring C and D materials to Leon Street or will

the the practice of going elsewhere continue well right now that isn't part of the plan right now um and Lewiston Street needs to be rehabilitated um part of the issue that we're having with the recyclables is it's not weathertight over there as it should be and there's none of space okay and so that is actually adversing effect adversely affecting it so there's some ala funds that have been set aside for

that they're not as much as the city would really need to really get to a situation there but uh really good situation but it's a sty and uh Mr Oliver has got a plan that I would leave to him to discuss you know to try to start getting to that point where we can start handling the stuff at Leon Street in a better fashion so that we're enhancing the value and not minimizing

the value now would that require or would that include a grinder So the plan that we that we have in in the process at this point is being vetted it's and we're we were working with a design firm uh the funds that we had earmarked for that are now going to be located just to do a site the site work at this point and to maintain the murf component the conveyor belts that

that's like a 7.5 million that's one of the things that we had to uh engineer out of the project so we could be able to get a safe location to drive into the site the site is going to be somewhat leveled and and made cleaned uh where we can have dumpsters that that folks could drop things off um but that's phase one that that should be happening shortly so we can present that and then the

building would be the secondary make sure that it's weather tight uh it's been open to the elements speak years um I know for at least 10 plus years uh repairing those there're some structural components that need to be repaired that's all being worked on it's being designed so that we can actually put a roof on that um and then try to work on the murf so I'm sure you know but a murf

is a facility where you can deal with uh separating out solid waste from recyclables and handling it um and the murf we're looking at is a a human run murf but there are these murfs out there that are robotic and they're run with AI that run 24 hours a day and the idea is be they're expensive ensive but the idea behind them is you get a much better quality recyclable out of it and you can

actually recycle more out of it so that's kind of being worked on a lot more than 7.5 million right so the idea is to try to do this on a budget well I know seven years ago um actually Council Pereira was on the council and myself and caros Cesar came for the council and asked about about putting the question for a uh transfer station on the ballot that year

um back then it was projected 10 to 15 million to put a good facility there so I can only imagine at this point yeah I mean the the site is is very important we need to make sure that that site is safe um if anyone's driven to uh DCM you know that the the the asphalt's in rough condition the scale is is not no longer working uh the salt shed is as uh me

meet its last leg so all that we're we're proposing as a a brand new site and safe for any Resident to come in and out U nice retaining wall all the uh site utilities making sure the water uh electric gas everything's up to up to Snuff so that's the the first part of that the second part of it is making sure that that building it has a nice uh envelope and and it's

enclosed and of course along with that comes rodent control too and that's that's another separate issue absolutely 12 about 12 15 years ago we we took down the stacks uh du due to the moratorium of of burning so we knew that wasn't going to happen in the Commonwealth and we took that down and we never replac the roof and now that you have a struct metal structural beams there you have um

the site itself it's in rough condition so right now that's what's taking really the longest to try to figure out if those structural beams are sound enough to you know to withstand the elements but what whatever is not sound will be placed and we'll put a brand new roof on that um and make it presentable that's the other key to to that make it presentable to to the Fall River residence okay thank you with that I

yield thank you vice president per you know I sit here after a long time listening to all of this and I I've got to tell you it it just frustrates me because Lewiston street is the way it is because maintenance was never done on it who's to blame for that you know it's always well we're not going to fix this we're not going to and then all of a sudden you expect the taxpayers here to

come up with brand new buildings I mean I built my home 40 something years ago it's still in good shape cuz I keep up with that but that's what has to happen you know when I look at the recyclables Cella Cella is a recycling company they wanted to come into for River years ago take a spot up at airport road do single stream recycling where they would build the facility they would take from other

areas as well but they would take our recyclables for 20 years for free and they would hire a 100 people to star at the time it was 20 $25 an hour that was good money back then and that got shot down by this city and I mean I met with them and it was a conveyor belt and people would be picking different things and putting them in bins those are murfs

that's a murf that's what happened and we could have had one and had our recyclables taken away for 20 years you'd say EAS is doing a good job I have to say that if there's a problem and I call I always get help from Carlos who's the manager here from this area I can't you know say that they're terrible I think they do an awesome job but when we

hired them we knew it was going to be cheap I said it I didn't vote to go private but we knew it was going to be short money in the first years but then it's going to add up come on they've got workers their workers are going to want more money there right everybody gets increase but can I respond to that one but no let me finish you but then we sold our

trucks remember we had bought trucks so from 2015 till now matter of fact I asked last weekend I got a call today giving me the answer we have three more years on paying off those trucks that we don't have 400 and some OD thousand this year 400 and some OD thousand next year and then our final payment is 100 and some OD thousand however the CFO at the time put

the trucks when we borrowed the money to buy the trucks to purchase the trucks the trucks and some police cruisers were put in so they're combined so you can't really separate but the trucks were what 100 Grand a piece or something more than that 200 like come on you know you look at and you alluded a couple of times during your your talk about single stream of recycling I get that you

talked about um pay as you throw come on we all know pay as you throw worked as we were moving forward with it what didn't work was how payers you throw came to this city it did not come to the city by a vote of the council it came to this city by a directive from the Board of Health and and that was the way to sneak under and get it in because

if it would have come through the city then you would have had the entire piece of the education because they have a whole list at the state there's a booklet on how you introduce this and when people wanted to get reelected and dropped the payers you throw to get themselves reelected and put on the backs of the taxpayers another 3 million coming out of our budget to pay for

trash I was in the AOS in July you know they pay for trash disposal they pay yeah little AAR tort a village of 450 people they pay to get rid of their trash and they pay for water so when you stopped it here the amount of tonnage that increased the North End got bombarded with tonnage because you had people from Somerset who used bags pay you throw they didn't want to use the

bags they would bring it here our tonage skyrocketed same thing happened in the south end with dividen things skyrocketed you say we're going to have L control we're going to have enforcement ow what does the enforcement do it's not criminal you don't go to court you come here to pay a bill they come here they don't pay it you know you slap them on the wrist please don't do that again so we never get so you're

having people go out give these citations and I had spoken to Allison about it how much did we get in citation we got nothing with hardly hardly any right and you know when you talk about nonprofits I'm sorry a lot of the nonprofits FL River has a lot of nonprofits in this city and police fire go to a lot of these nonprofits every single day or several times a week why

are they not paying a pilot nonprofits with CEOs making six figures or better but they can't assist the city and give a pilot you know I think the $100 per household I thought that was a little unfair only because if you have you know I did have a six family I don't anymore but I had so in one apartment I've got one person living and they're going to pay the same amount as the apartment

next door that has six people living or four people living and when I've talked to seniors and people have talked about trash and talked about I've had people say I wish we had payers you throw be but for me I would go with payers you throw because you know counselor I pay for what I dispose of but when we had pay you throw and they got rid of it do

you know how bad it was I'm a Dunkin Donuts kind of gal Dunkin Donuts Burger King Wendy's all the they took all their barrels out because people were literally going and throwing trash in a business Barrel because they didn't want to buy a bag I thought our bags were horrible should have had a better quality bag do we still have bags I know how many cases oh several cases several hundreds of

thousands of cases yeah several cases and we had to pay the company for them absolutely so it's like it just flaws me this resolution here came in in 2020 February of 2020 we're almost in February of 2024 couple more days and this this is all we have so far now with the pink carts people paid for them so they can keep them who's picking up those pink carts it's mainly businesses that have

them a flower shop or this or that they have them so they're going to keep their pink carts and we're still going to pick them up we're not going to pick them up they're just going to keep them they paid for them we can't take the cash back it's their property we're not picking it up we're not picking it up I thought you just said we are picking it up no we're collecting the other bins

but we can't you know put away but we can't collect those pink bins because they paid for them we're just not going to we're not collecting the trash room but you know maybe I just find that if people don't want to follow the rules then you have to be a little bit stricter so if people are not complying and not doing recycling the way they would then you say to them we're taking

your barels you need to get a private company to come and take them that's possibility and you give them so much because if you just want to hand them a ticket and then they're not going to pay it and how can we force them it's not Criminal how can we force them can we force them yes how I'll address that in a second okay you all right and when you talked about textiles

I've got to tell you at a war council meeting this woman came in and she talked about textiles and I did mention it to Father father Rob over on uh Plymouth Avenue so there is a box there they provide the little shed you drop off whatever clothing or whatever you have in there and it gets weighed and you get a percentage you could have some of those too and the city would get paid

for doing that well that's what the company's going to do we'll get a rebate right the private company will pick it up we'll get a part of the rebate so could you put some of those on Leon Street so people can go there and dispose that we're having conversations with that I mean Leon Street is a pigpen absolutely and the conditions that people work in there it's horrible that's our goal that's our

goal is to make sure that that that that site number one and the condition of the building is taken care of you know we've we've done all these committees over and over and over and over for trash councel um Dion and myself were put on that committee we went we're interested in figuring this out how many meetings did we have Michelle two um maybe maybe three maybe three and

then we never a call again and we never knew what happened so I'm glad that this came forward but at the time that this resolution was filed mhm waste was $97 a 10 a ton now it's 113 and recyclable goes up and down it depends on what the market is I like the idea about um the the cardboard because cardboard we can get back and the school department should pay for their trash the thing

about cardboard is if it gets wet it's useless right um so that's that's the that's the other part that we have to look at but Matt right in a way when attorney Thomas talks about many people getting things delivered I mean I just got mats for my husband's car it came in a big cardboard box I didn't throw it out I have it downstairs cuz it's a nice box well no cuz I can probably use the

cardboard when I do some kind of crafting so I don't get the cement floor in the garage uh painted or something right now but if you if you get four or five of those at some point you oh I got to get rid of them no but you know a lot of people do order online and it would be good to have someplace it's a conversation we're going to have but you

know attorney Thomas I I can appreciate appreciate the conversations I can cuz there's a lot of work to come up with solutions to problems but it's like we have a conversation that we don't hear there's never anything done you know what I mean it's either poop will get off the pot I'll address that too you know what is it I mean there are members of this Council who have said we'll be

on a committee we'll help we're willing to do that but then nothing happen and it just frustrates me all the money that we've spent on paying for trucks that we don't have and you know having people from out of town come I I'll tell you there was a gentleman on Cory street called me up said you know somebody comes by and they drop trash over here a trash bag all the

time he said but this time I went out I got the bag I put on rubber gloves and I went through the bag the guy lived in Idan what he forgot to do was take out his uh pay St with his name and the company and I went there with the bag of trash I met with him I said this is your trash please bring it back to tiban because if it's there again there's

going to be a problem you can't be just coming and dropping your trash right on the side of the cemetery he figured nobody from the cemetery was going to say anything right but you know when they do that when they dump stuff up in the reservation why isn't something made public when they do catch somebody let people know that we are working on it and and we're seeing it you know and

they don't do that you know we don't take any construction disposal you know debris and stuff but by us not taking that and somebody having to drive away those are the ones that you see down near cook Pond down you know in the reservation down the bottom of of Jefferson Street and unless we have cameras or we catch people but then it's got to be known that this person did this right because that will deter

people but I I you know I just I want you to do something but I I just think it's taken so long and if it is that we need to put back pay as you throw because you clearly can see what the differences are what the benefits are then let's talk about that everybody's afraid to talk about that but that will take what is you know all the tonage that you have for recycling

and for trash what does that cost per year about 3 million oh more than that more than that so that would be 3 million or more in the budget to do other things people need to understand that people need to see that before when we had the landfill and we could just dump it there that was great that doesn't exist now right and you know you talked about the train we're getting the

train is it going to be less expensive to put it on the train it's a different train not you can't put trash on a commuter ra no but I mean but we have the tracks I should say it's always the cheapest way to go yeah but we'll see what happens with the how about the Waterfront we have we can't put it on a barge and ship it somewhere what are those options the

okay I I want to address all these things but I want to make sure that you're done before I address them go ahead go ahead go ahead thank you okay so let's I can talk to you about this all night well so can I that's why so something done let's start backwards and go for go from there so the barge the trouble is most of it goes over Ohio so

well God bless Ohio rail is the easiest way over 100 miles rail is the most cost effective energy-friendly if um environmentally friendly and efficient way to get it there so that's why it mostly goes by rail I agree with 90% of what you said I I I understand the frustration okay I think the frustration you're voicing is the frustration that's felt throughout the city and it's a

valid frustration this has gone and fits and stops do something one thing I will tell tell you the administration is going to do something good okay the fact that we're chatting with you the fact that we've started to move along these lines this Administration is going to handle this it has no choice because it's not a matter of not wanting to do it but financially it has no choice you

have to do it if you're bringing diamond on for 6 million then you need to be able to you want to fix lewison Street and that's going to cost you money there are choices that have to be made but it's got to be fair throughout the city so I agree the the issue about the public works as a nation we love to build but we hate to maintain public works and it happens

every municipality every state every throughout the federal government they'll build a highway and then five years later the highway the bridges are crumbling okay we don't we're we're a great country of Builders and not so much about maintainers things get to a point where you really do have to get to a point of having to build something new and that's unfortunate with regard to the collections

the way the collections are going to be done and I'm kind of structuring them they're going to be fair they're going to be Equitable throughout the people are going to be given more than enough chances to understand what they're supposed to do but in the long run these are going to end up on your tax bill when they end up on as Municipal charges when they end up on your tax bill

they're going to go in tax title and if you don't pay it it'll be a bigger impact on you than just not wanting to pay it and so people will be made to understand they'll be encouraged to understand that doing what you're supposed to do on behalf of yourself and for your neighbors as well is probably the most cost-effective way to do it can I can I say something to that we have

properties in the city that you know maybe are occupied by people that don't live in the city and they let that grass grow crazy high and we have uh Mr Hathway's group has to go out and mow the lawn we send somebody to M the lawn and that gets put on their tax title but you know what to them it's worth it because we charge what 25 bucks 50 bucks yes so if this guy or

person had to hire a landscaper to come and take care of it do they care that it's going to be on there no because it's going to be on there when they decide to sell then they'll these are going to be penalties okay the people will pay these and as a matter of fact last month in C tax title collection we were still collecting you're right we were colleting sanitary household fees

still from on a particular bosel okay it took us this long to collect it but we collected it so the key is to try to make sure that we're being fair about it we're being Equitable about it and that we're being consistent about it that's been probably the biggest issue that we've had over the past 10 years with Municipal Solid Waste here we've gone in fits and starts I'm not saying for any

bad reason but people have had different ways of looking at it the point about pay you throw I'm not suggesting that we put pay you throw back back in but the fact of the matter is that during at 2018 the last year pay you throw we were collecting 177,000 tons of garbage and now we're collecting and now we're collecting 28,000 and we've only increased the amount of households by a thousand but you're going to be

increasing more households with all this market rate housing no doubt well it's not just the market rates was going to be 79 and everything else absolutely so those are the things but I think the biggest point point is and you hit on this is the partnership issue the goal and the practice now that I think you're going to start seeing is the administration developing options and speaking to the council about which

option makes the most sense because there has to be total City bu in on these things I I caution you some of the decisions are going to be tough decisions and it's important that the council have the opportunity to do that uh but the council and I have every hope that they will be has to be ready to make tough decisions this is not a we won't just deal with it and it's going

to go away this problem is not going to go away this challenge is not going to go away tough decisions are going to have to be made the same way tough decisions are going to have to be made with funding Diamond I don't mind making tough decisions but will we get the materials in advance and it's not a typical we need this decision today and how many times that happened here's

the good thing last week at two weeks ago at ordinance and tonight we're not asking you to do anything we're here to give you information and this is part of the fact of informing the council providing information to the residents starting to lay out some of the parameters of the tough decisions that have to be made and then when those decisions are made they're informed decisions informed decisions tend to

last longer and I think you you need to really take a vote on what is in the best interest of the city and not play to whatever keyboard Warrior is putting on Facebook but to do what's in the best interest of the city and trash it's definitely going to be tough decisions but you have to make the decision if you want to do Leon Street if you want to

put on the new diamond you need to make those decisions and you know the sooner the mayor meets with the counselors and gets a feel from everybody what does everyone collectively think and go in unanimously we're together we're a team we know what we're doing and this is why we're doing it and then move forward I think this I don't know Mr attorney Thomas that sorry thank you so much for

all your explanation Al thanks for being here is there anything you want to add you were kind of quiet no no I just just wanted to say I mean we do have we do have some spreadsheets we do have some numbers we do have things that you're going to have to we get cies of that yeah when when we're when we're ready to present absolutely we're just this is just for information for us to show that

we are doing our due diligence before we present anything to you um so you will have an opportunity to to vet every piece of material to make the wise decision well thank you so much uh Mr chairman I you thank you councilor so um my questions are quick how many letters are going out probably about uh 350 to 400 okay how many nonprofits are we talking all depends what you can say

that's why we're not going to the nonprofits yet because in looking at the nonprofits when we go look at the list the way I'm looking at this list is off the city's assessors records and we're culling through that list because what's listed as a nonprofit is the state is the city is everybody else so we're pulling through there to actually see how many there are really when you come right down to

it there's not a lot of nonprofits they have a lot of property so if you look at South Coast hospital that's one nonprofit look at all the properties they own okay obviously the Catholic Church okay the properties that they have so you I don't think you're going to see a huge list of nonprofits you're going to see a pretty sizable list of the Apostles that they own and the apostles that they own are

very different I I would tend to think and not to pick on on the on the church but Apostle where there's a statue sitting on it on Second Street is a lot different than apostle that is a former Church down the South End okay and the impacts of those properties uh on to Municipal services are different so the whole reason that an entity becomes a nonprofit under the law is that it's in

order to become in order to provide the services that are essential for the community that it does it needs to get some help from the community and so the community provides that help by making it tax exempt and that's supposed to make it more viable to be able to provide the services that they need we don't want to impact adverse ly those services but we think that within that conversation it's possible for them to

help pay a little bit of these costs in a way that's not going to adversely impact and now I'm sure that if you were to talk to them they disagree totally with me but that's the benefit of a conversation so I think for my clarification the comment at ordinance was about the nonprofits and you use the church example I mean I work for the dasis yeah I mean for 10 years at the

school in the church we've had our own dumpster we've had our own recycling we've paid for it through a a company ever since and that's why we have to look at them one by one by one yeah so you know I that's why I know you guys are working on that but I really would like that honed into because the word nonprofit is a very vague word when it comes to all the different complexities

like you just explained but I guess from my clarification would be how many of those nonprofits are we really talking and what is that impact because I know the business trashes is one thing but I think this is another and how we handle that is important um because you're right there are the Das as a whole has a lot of properties churches schools whatever may be yeah I'm not trying to pick on them no no no

no I'm not no offense taken I'm just again clarification part of you know you're comparing the DIY the churches to South Coast Health which is a no I understand grp and that's and and when you look at some of the others and that's why I think I me I answered I spoke with you about this at ordinance it's why we're not dealing with it yet we want to make sure that we measure

twice and cut once before we address this because again we don't want to adversely affect the services that they're providing for the city absolutely agreed the last thing I want to ask is on the Leon Street when do we expect to have a more detailed plan of what like you know two three five years from now what do you expect Lewis and Street to be when are you going to be in a position to present

that to us well the designers right now are are doing the feasibility slash design work um we we did come up with a a general idea of what it could look like but we're no no way close to coming up with that I would say within the next six months we should have some type of a design that will include some site work um but we just don't have that yet but

the building is is will be designed after that we took we took that building component away from it just to make sure that we started the design right away okay so within six months we have some idea it's going to look like got it all right can I make a motion that we table this again because if not I think we're going to lose them and they won't

come back to us so he won't lose us you put that in the form of a motion Council uh motion uh to table motion table made by vice president Council Pera second by Council Deion all in favor I I post thank you for your time thank you gentlemen appreciate it solid stuff I think uh the way this is is playing out probably every two weeks there'll be something coming out sweet from this

point on um it's a matter like I said the next thing you're going to see I think will be the uh solicitations good thank you gentlemen could we could I make a motion to take item eight out of order of course second motion made and second all in favor I so move item eight is a resolution for discussion of public health concerns regarding 222 pekam Street we need to motion lift from the table

motion to lift from the table second motion made in second all in favor I all oppos so moved gonna ask director hathway to come down thank you good afternoon sir or good evening whatever time you're looking at for the record please name and title uh Glenn hathway Building Commissioner for the city of for River thank you good evening evening good evening so I'm going to give you the

opportunity to just provide us an update regarding this the last last time this was discussed was August of 23 um so if you could give us an update on 222 peckam Street please so to my knowledge there's been no complaints to me personally on my department uh I've spoken to Leo a couple of weeks ago um I guess one of the neighbors over there is still experiencing some issues uh is not happy um I've heard no

complaint I go by there on a regular basis I sit and watch them on a regular basis uh Leo sees me some of the neighbors see me um there's nothing there at this point in time that I am aware of uh he has rodent uh control there I've witnessed the boxes um he is parking trucks there he's not on loading trucks there uh he knows he's being watched they they know my car they know

my truck they know know everything about me and they see me there so so far it's been good as far as I'm concerned um if you ask Leo he may not be totally happy but when was the last time a citation was issued long time ago okay long time ago all right I make a motion leave to withdraw okay any are there any questions before we that motion a motion made Grant lead to withdraw second

second all in favor I oppos thank you thank you thank you sir go back to the agenda here item four is a resolution to discuss tree stump removals in the city tabled 331 2022 we need a motion to lift from the table motion to lift from the table motion to make the table second second all in favor I opposed so moved ask Mr Pino to come down good evening sir good evening name

and title for the record please Chris poo assistant planner welcome thank you for having me so the resolution that was tabled on 33122 regarding the current status of the removal of tree stumps throughout the city and Mr PR I know you sent us an email but I'll will let you take an opportunity to discuss it sure thank you so at the time of the resolution um in our inventory we had 649 stumps um when

I checked the other day on Tuesday uh we were down to 193 in our inventory so a pretty good reduction um we have an allocation of arpa funding available to remove stumps um and we've uh contracted with uh third party to help us uh remove some stumps so we allocated just over a quarter of a million do we have about $40,000 left um for them to do some stump removal at this point Point um

we've paused the private contractors work um to do a better assessment and reinvent some of our properties because we've been doing work internally um so if you look at our inventory most of the stumps left in that inventory will be in Oak grve North burial North and Kennedy Parks um but we've sent um internal staff to do that with our stunt grinder so we need to get back out there see

what's actually on the ground before we move forward with expending uh private contracted funds um additionally since the resolution we've um reworked our contract with our um private contractor to remove stumps at the time they're removing trees it's costing us a little bit more money for tree removal but um the stumps are no longer an issue and creating a backlog for us um an oversight um that we're correcting

right now too was we had a stump reporting uh form on the website um in the transition to the new website um I missed that it's no longer there so I'm working with the IT department to get that back up probably by the end of this week um so residents can report uh stump either at their property um or something that they see throughout the city so we're addressing it um and I think we've

seen a significant reduction in the number of stumps that's there vice president Pera um Chris I'm surprised Mr Martin isn't here isn't he running the cemetery and trees he is yes I'm I'm still serving as the tree warden so um I'm overseeing these projects um especially this was an part of this was an arpa uh contract in which um I just wanted to know he was still around because I think he's doing a great job

he's doing a phenomenal job don't we have a stump grinder we do yes we have two actually yeah so who's removing the stumps our workers both so we've used private contractors and internal staff with 650 of them you had to use ex we had to use um private contractors to help us catch up how many people are now in the tree Department it's a difficult question to answer so Chris Martin is technically in the tree

department but he's also serving as the um service out of rank director for the cemetery and then we have two dedicated staff to the tree Department um so tree department has two three two something like that yes well before they had one before they had one yes for many years while I was down there we had one I mean it's pretty hard for one person to go and cut down a tree it's actually

impossible for one C A somebody there somebody's going to get her up yep all right well I'm glad to see that some of them are being cut down because um I know Lawrence Street has some trees and big stumps it's raise the sidewalks and people are going to fall over there so that might be one you're looking at what what we do when we get complaints about sidewalks and trees we go out and assess

the condition of the tree we look at the sidewalk and we refer the the sidewalk to either DCM uh we we refer to DCM and then they take a look at the the sidewalks if they decide that they're going to fix the sidewalks well they're going to fix the sidewalks but when they schedule the sidewalk repair um they'll remove the panels and assess whether or not they can put sidewalks back with the

tree existing if they can't that's when we remedy the tree issue um so Lauren Street for example they have not scheduled that to my knowledge when they're going to address the sidewalks yet um but when they do then we'll address the trees we don't we don't want to take the trees down if they're not need I think over the years they've planted trees that are not trees that should be planted on a sidewalk because

of the root system right so now that there's an arborist we have a contracted arist right both myself and Chris Martin are certified uh qualified tree wardens for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts so um we have redone our complete urban forestry program working with our Arbus and our internal staff to identify appropriate trees to be planted in appropriate locations so we're no longer

planting large maple trees on sidewalks those are going in Parks um and we're looking at smaller grow um species to go in sidewalk panels we're not planting large Oaks under power lines or they're going to interfere with the power lines any longer um there was a big push in the 50s and 60s to plant laes everywhere I know that there's a push to plant trees because the greenery it's good for

the o oygen and everything there's a been a push but Eastern Avenue for example and Bron Avenue they had put trees there the trees they put there I knew the gentleman who lived on the corner of Bron Avenue and side street he was filling up water from his house to go and water those trees cuz those trees weren't getting wed that's crazy the city put them in and we got a private

res I mean he was he enjoyed doing that and you know um he was involved with Maryann Wardell God Rest her soul when she she was the the tree lady for the city of Far River that really pushed for trees but now you put them all on Eastern Avenue they planted all these trees but do we have the Manpower after to take care of them so with two people there what's the plan for that a couple

couple things on that note Eastern Avenue was planted through the arpa program in the RF uh the invitation for bid that I wrote they the contractor the private contractor who planted the trees still owns them for two years that's when they need to be watered so they are required to water for the next two years so anything you've seen planted in the past couple of years through the arbor

program which is Eastern a Highland a um there's some in the Flint neighborhood um and on South Main Street um all of those are owned by the private private contractor still we have not taken final ownership of them they have to survive two years from the contractor uh through their warranty so they're out watering they have to water once a week the first year and TW every other week uh in the

second second year our arborist will go back out and do a final inspection before we accept them if anything doesn't make it which we've already rejected about 60 or 65 trees um they have to be replaced and then watered again for two years okay just that I I like seeing you know the plantings and um but I just question how do you continue to maintain them because that's what our city has a problem with we've

made significant efforts into making sure that the urban forestry program that we're implementing is sustainable um because the city has been investing uh significant money into doing it which I think is important we want to make sure that that investment is uh protected well I put this resolution in in 2020 right and now in 2024 we finally have we're down to 193 so I think there's less but we'll call

it 193 yes okay maybe there is less but at least it's moving in the right direction so I thank you um y i i yield U Mr chairman okay I'll say a motion I'll make a motion leave to withdraw second motion Grant leave to withdraw made in second all in favor I I thank you and I think Chris does a really good job Chris I think that he does a great

job down there he's a tremendous asset to our yeah he is absolutely thank you thank you sir you're welcome item number five is a resolution for the committee on health and environmental Affairs to convene quarterly to review and discuss the water supply and Water Filtration plant tabled 331 2022 need a motion from the table from the table motion made second second it all in favor I could I

make a motion that we take item five which is the quarterly Report with the Filtration plant item six is wastewater treatment and item seven uh which is the sewer treatment violia because it's all the same people yeah M Mr ferland's going to speak on all of them anyway so so item number six and seven to lift from the table second yeah we need to make a motion to take five six and seven together

together but I got to lift them before I take them together no no okay so item five six and seven make a to take them together and lift them all from the table motion made to lift uh to take five six and seven Together made in second all in favor I and then the motion to lift from the table item six and seven counselor yes made and seconded all in favor I so

moved so I already stated item five item six is the resolution discuss complaints of odors emanating from the wastewater treatment plant which was tabled on 92722 and then item seven is the resolution of the committee on health and environmental Affairs to convene with the administrative Community utilities and a representative from violia water to discuss storm water catch Bas and maintenance protocol to

avoid mosquito born illnesses and microbio growth so we'll start Mr furland if you can introduce yourself please yep uh Paul ferland the administrator of community utilities Tero Jim Tero presid the toer water board thank you gentlemen for both being here so let's start with item five um discussing the water quality uh former councelor Lee filed this resolution so if you can give us an update on where we

are with that yeah so again just uh brief overview um North wupa Pond is in very good condition as of today we were 6 in above full pond uh with the uh rain that a lot of the rain that we've got over over this past year uh our water supplies are looking in great shape uh southw Tua Pond uh which is an emergency water supply for us is what this afternoon was negative 18 in below

below full pond I know that was a topic of discussion with some residents uh over the past couple of weeks since the uh elevation did rise from the heavy rains that we received before uh and after uh Christmas so the pond has been coming down we have been uh maintaining the gates and the trash racks as needed to be able to to bring that pond down our water filtration plan uh has been uh

has been operating uh no KN on wood we have not had uh any major issues uh to this point uh distribution system at this time we have had uh we have had some distribution uh disruptions over the past couple of weeks with the change in temperatures uh and the uh snow conditions that we've had and stuff like that uh we've been able to maintain all of those either water main breaks or service leaks with our own

staff Council of Vice President per um Mr F how many workers do we have now at the filtration plan how many are all certified and what's that looking like up there yeah so down at the filtration plan we do have uh we we are almost full staffed uh we are short two staff members right now uh and one is out uh one is out on leave um we are uh we do

have uh three excuse me four uh licensed operator two of them uh are on shift excuse me three of them are on shift so we're short one shift operator right now uh so we have made great improvements um and thanks to uh you know this Council and um other things you know we were able to get uh you know pay rates comparable to other communities uh to be able to draw in some uh some licensed

operat so the unions did a side letter Y we were able to get that done right we were able to work with the unions we did two side letters one was with operators and then we did another one uh last year with all the water department staff which the fy2 24 budget supported now the old building that's up there which was the old treatment facility um I know that there's been a couple of breaks

people have gone in there they have cameras up there but are we going to get some other cameras up there to make sure nobody goes in that oh yeah so the 18 7 uh the 1873 Pump Station at the bottom of the hill uh we have put some trail cams up there to try to catch it uh you know police regularly Patrol that area um when we constructed the new water

maintenance facility at the top of the hill uh we installed the CC TV camera system as well as a server to be able to do that uh the plan is to be able to use that same server and bring it down the bottom of the hill to both the that facility and the water treatment plant okay with that I yell I don't have any thank you Council councel anything from

you okay so I'll entertain a motion to table this matter so we can revisit it in the next quarter motion to table second on item five yes motion to table item five was made in second all in favor I no oppose so moved thank very item I know there's two more you going to far item six um is in regards to oders coming from the wastewater treatment plant Mr frin if you can give

us an update on that please yep so uh last time I was in front of this committee uh there was uh complaints it was probably about uh a year 92722 a little over a year ago so it was not this past summer the end of the summer before um I was in front of this committee and we talked uh we talked a little bit about uh you know the wastewater treatment plant what goes on

down there um if you remember back too one of the things that we did that I discussed uh was how the summer of 22 was a very dry summer uh that year was a drought year uh and one of the things that uh you know I expressed was that our our sewer system um is not large enough to take all of our storm water as as we know uh but then it's also too big

to be able to maintain just uh uh sewage when we have a when we have a dry summer uh this past summer was a very wet summer uh we had a lot of rainstorms so some of them high intensity and that helped move everything through the system get it down to our plant so we were able to uh to go through our go through our wastewater treatment plan uh

this year we re I'm not going to say we didn't get and you know we didn't receive any order complaints we received some but very few compared to uh the summer of 22 uh other uh steps that we took uh we got what's called a drone meter uh so that's a special meter that we take uh and it reads the uh air quality so it reads hydrogen sulfide which is typically the smell that people

uh complain about within the air uh and we do measurements around the facility and then different spots around the neighborhoods uh surrounding the facility to uh to to uh you know take take those readings make sure they're not excuse me in excess of where we feel that uh they should be Council Dion so being someone who only has one house between themselves and the treatment plant I'm very familiar with odors Etc um

so I think this is one of those situations that just because people don't complain doesn't mean it doesn't exist I can tell you I've never ever ever complained but I've smelled it many times um and again when you live there um it has to be bad to notice it I let there's times people come down and say oh my God I'm like oh what it smells today I don't know I can't smell it

because you just you just adapt to it so with that said um I know this year a few months back um we had a lot of quite a fair number of horrendous days I mean and when I say horrendous day that's the day I walk out of the house and I go oh it's ripe today so I know sometimes you have mixers that break down I know I believe that there was a

time when sludge being put into Vehicles would cause odors because the the the door on the on the building wasn't uh operating correctly um what are other circumstances under which that this happens and what's been done to remedy some of these causes yeah so I can tell you probably the time that uh you that you discussed um so this as you know we've been going through a major plant upgrade uh which upgrades all of

our sludge dewatering facilities um so we had four gravity thickeners before three of them were in operation uh we had a building that had old belt filter presses uh we're currently upgrading all all of that uh equipment now uh we used to take What's called the primary sludge which comes from our primary settling basins and our uh was which is waste activated sludge um that comes from our

bioreactor we used to take those two co-mingle them put them into the gravity thickeners um now we are keeping those uh those separate so we're going to have W in couple of gravity gravity thickeners and then we're going to have the Primary in a individual uh that will keep the oage down um as we were going through the construction there was some times where our gravity thickeners uh we

were unable to do them because they would use them because they were doing work within those gravity thickeners uh we did have to back sludge up into some of our clarifiers which does create a bit bit more of an Oda um now we have a separate was tank onlined thicken was and then we have a a primary uh primary uh gravity thickener online they're working in the number one gravity thickener right now um but again with

everything separated it creates less less of an odor so once this construction is fully complete which will probably be in the fall uh next fall we uh will have everything separated uh not comingled uh new Oda control system so again the Oda control system from those Gravity thickeners the old aut control system change the air out uh in those uh in those gravity thickeners anywhere from

four to six times uh per hour the new system changes out 12 times per hour so it scrubs that air a lot more to make sure that uh to make sure that that's you know the air quality going through the going through the um the scrubber is a lot better and able to be maintained so it would be fair to say that there should be a significant decrease yes um you know again significant decrease

primary clarifiers are not covered so those are open ear um you know we do have our secondaries that are open a as well so without those having fully encapsulated going through air scrubbers there still is always a potential well again um you know everything is relative corre when you know when so for me a significant difference would be I don't smell it y she's going to smell it you're going to smell it but I'm not

going to smell it because and I know that sounds crazy and I'm sure some people listening is saying she's whacked but but it's true um exactly you know there's been a few houses in in the neighborhood that have sold in the last year or so and honestly what made the difference for some of those sales not happening were those people people from outside coming in and they smelled they smelled it and it was like oh my

God so but again once once you're there for a while so to me that's a significant uh that's significant and I know other people who live across the tracks it would be significant for them um because again for us to to Really react to it it's it's bad and I lived through the days of SOS I was living there in the SOS days and I know it there's no comparison um was the the significance

of the smell comparable yes but the length of time the number of times night and day so um so that's good to know um and you said that should be give or take come fall yeah should be 100% complete with that project right around fall and um has the catch Basin been put in at the end right just on yep so we installed the catch Basin down there which ties into the separated drainage

system that goes into the plant you know yeah because I I did notice that street didn't flood like it did before yes all right thank you with that I thank you vice president per well I think that when we get complaint when I get complaint from people down there which usually in the summer that you know when more people complain and they put in some kind of scented Citrus or other

things like that but violia has that contract down the waste water when is their contract when is this contract up so their contract is up this uh this fiscal year so I just went out to uh bid ifb uh and we yeah and we just opened those uh last Thursday uh there was two interested parties that bid uh and my Department's in the process who are the interested party so violia and infrar

where's infrar from uh so they're a us-based company but they have a lot of their facilities that they uh do onm on in the Midwest uh in the South um they do have one in Connecticut uh fairly good-sized company they do manage some good plants and they are real uh you know again they gave a good proposal but we're just starting to dive into the proposals so you have both of those beds

that came in already correct okay I'd like to see them to see what the bids will yeah no problem I can get you a copy could you get a copy I maybe the entire committee get a copy yeah I do electronically so I can provide them electronically to the full Council you know that's a 10year contract so that that contract does come down to the council right but I just I'm curious to

see um you know what the difference would be between the two of them and see what happens yeah there was another third interested party through the bidding process that asked a lot of questions did plant tours uh and stuff like that but they didn't end up submitting a bid they didn't submit a bid what was that one Woodward and curen okay aren't they out of Florida no uh they're out of Maine they're based out

of Maine but they're uh they're east coast up to about Missouri a guy from Woodward and C that came up for a while yeah he worked at the uh water plant assist they didn't put in I'm surprised no yeah they they sent a very nice letter but they didn't feel that they uh would be able to be competitive oh they can't be competitive that's fine um I yield yield council is there a motion

motion uh leave to withdraw second motion Grant to withdraw item six is made in second all in favor I any post and item seven now item seven is to discuss the infrastructure changes in regards the catch basins and the updated status on that Mr furland yeah so again last time we were at we I was in front of this committee the committee asked um to provide a list of all the catch basons that were cleaned

in the prior year and I I provided that to the council um you know again our uh our catch Basin we have over 6,000 throughout the whole entire city um through our seom uh requirement with the EPA as well as our ms4 requirement uh we maintain those catch basins uh on a on a rolling average uh we do have trouble areas that we do hit more often uh they

may be low spots or they may be areas that have a lot of sediment that come down uh into them so there may be more on a quarterly or or an annual uh cleaning schedule uh that's all maintained again uh through violia through their um infonet program uh we are switching asset management and work Auto Management Systems uh from some of the oer systems to the one that the uh Community utilities division has

standardized uh which is utility Cloud um so that'll be for water sewer and storm water will will be on the same platform councilor Dion now I know Opa funding was used to purchase um street sweepers that were supposed to be used for this purpose yep and has that been done and who's been operating them yeah so the so the city has received two of the street sweepers uh and it's the

Broom the broom style Pelican the three- wheeled ones with the brushes uh they received those in the fall and they have been operational by DCM uh so the original proposal was for those two Street uh sweepers to go to DCM there is also a third one that's on order they were all ordered at the same time it took us about a year and a quarter to get those Pelicans excuse me will probably be

about a year and a half or so uh probably two years till we get the next one uh which is a vac style um because that has a uh that has a heavy duty uh cap and Chassis and then they put whole entire vac equipment on the back of it so um those take a bit longer to be able to get so I expect that one probably in the springtime that'll be uh used by

Community utility so water our sewer this spring or next spring this spring this spring you should have thank you very much I appreciate that so I imagine that will or the theory is uh help to assist in uh being more efficient in in terms of getting to these um get into these areas cleaning them out and yeah without a doubt you know and again we we talked a little bit about

this last time you know one of the things that people don't understand the leaf litter uh the road debris they see the street sweepers go down the street and they like it because it's beautifying their street the one of the big reasons to Streep sweep the streets is to get the road uh the sand and salt and uh bird droppings and all of that off of the roadway the leaves to get

that off the roadway so it doesn't end up in our catch basins doesn't end up in the combined sewer system or the uh separated ms4 system uh I was just at a conference and one of the things that they talked about uh was the amount of loading that uh Leaf lter has on uh nutrients that can flow into uh streams and ponds uh South wupa has a very large Watershed and I know

some of the councilors aware of some of the work that we've been doing on South wupa to figure out the uh solutions to the algae issues within South Wata street sweeping by the communities around uh around the pond is going to be one of the big Solutions and again um and again where I live we're at the bottom of the city uh can't get too much lower I have two catch basins right outside the house one

right on the property there um and you're right it sometimes in the fall it's incredible how many leaves pile up there yeah it's absolutely incredible yeah you know and the fall our crews go around to clean the catch Basin off but again with over 6,000 throughout the city it's very tough um and you know like I said last time I was here I did a brief education on how the catch how a catch Basin works

you know everybody thinks that a catch basin's full cuz they see the coffee cups floating on the on the water um but that's not necessarily the case that it's full at that point there's an area in the bottom where the sediment sits then water sits on top of that the outlet pipe is usually 3 to 4 feet above the bottom of the catch Basin and that's where you see that those cups sitting

there's usually a trap there so sewer gases don't come back out and that's where you see those cups and stuff sitting maybe a foot or two below the grate um so you know people might look down and say oh that's full of trash and Bottles floating there on top of the water but that's actually designed to have the floatable trash sit on top lower area for the heavy debris to be

able to settle out and then an area for the water to be able to go into the into the sewer pipe or the separated system that I yeld thank you Mr Terio would you like to add something um if I could interject something I probably should have done it under number five um we um celebrated our 150th birthday on June uh January the eth January the 5th 1874 the pumping station was started 3

days later the water had filled the distribution system to South Main Street so we we calculate January 8th 1874 is our birthday in 150 years and we're going to be talking about that throughout the year and the improvements that have come um Paul is very busy obviously with the daytoday and I have the Leisure of being able to um come in and and do some things so one of the

things we did is I have gone back and we kept thankfully uh a lot of the old records and we're going over the annual reports and it's a very interesting study in the progress of portable drinking King water to the city and how farsighted the Alder the board of aldermen were and the mayor at that time um that said um I'm going to uh produce a document that'll be the highlights for

instance just one little thing in uh 1954 the department planted 9,000 trees we were always wondering where the white pine and the ballom came from and it was uh in 1954 so going back through the reports we're we're learning a lot about our own history and um it's it's it's an eyeopener it really is uh it's very interesting situation and Fall River was very very farsighted when they began the

whole thing um also I'd like to say we have two environmental police officers we'd love to have more but it's a problem they go to the academy they have to go to the academy same as a regular police officer I'll make it real quick and and that cuts into being able to uh Patrol dumping and and whatnot they do a good job two guys that's it Monday I accompanied one of the workers

in the Watershed and he had filled a truck with trash um it's roadside trash we always try to find if there are envelopes or anything with identification but um it's a constant battle it's it it's it's a sad State of Affairs frankly from my perspective because it's drinking water is so important and uh littering along there is just intolerable if I may Mr Tero I think it's interesting you know even talking

to some of my students they don't realize the vast resource that we have here in the city alone so I'm wondering as you go through that process could you make that available to our young people in the city we would very much like to do that should have TS it's a great field trip for yeah listen you can you can be the fir you can be you can be the first school you visit give my students

a presentation on it if you're familiar with the O pumping station one of the things we discovered work there it was it was built in the pond and the reason the driveway goes around the back I don't I never knew this was because they built a coffer Dam out there they drilled down to bedrock and then they backfilled with the granite they were cutting out of Bedford Street and then put the plant in it just

amazing most of it was quarried on site yes so so just to add on that this year you know 150 years of continuous service for us is kind of a big deal 2020 was when the water department was 150 years old the original for of water department 2020 wasn't the we weren't able to move forward with any types of celebrations but um you know I have a list of people right now that that'll

want to do tours which looking to schedule we're always open to do tours of either uh our operational treatment plan our older facilities uh coming this spring we like to have an open house up at our water maintenance facility uh the new building up there uh as well as the tower across the street um public education about water and waste water is one thing that uh is extremely lacking

you know everybody always turns on their faucet and uh it goes down the drain you know but how does it get to that faucet how does it get down that drain and wi as it go so that it doesn't hurt the environment you know that that's a huge thing and um it's talked out throughout my industry amongst people that um people really uh kind of Tak it for granted a lot of the times uh the

service that we provide um and the uh you know what we give to what we give to the people so uh this year I one big push that I really want to work on is public education uh I'm going to dery tomorrow to talk to a group of students um that environmental Technologies and construction about uh about uh job opportunities within this field and and you know one of the things that I start

off with I when I'm talking to students I say you know I'm Paul furland you know I run the Water and Sewer Department how many people have used the product that I make today nobody's hand goes up and I said well I guess nobody use the restroom or wash their hands or anything like that and then they it starts to they start to realize it connection so vice president Pereira uh of the

6,000 that we have uh how many of them are cleaned every year so we have a target of doing at least 600 a year we usually exceed that Target right but for 6,000 that we have think about it and we're doing 600 a year takes 10 years it's not even taken us it's taken us more than 10 years if we did a thousand a year it would be 10 years yep should we be doing that more

frequently you know who has that equipment that you know goes in and pulls pulls it out and yep cleans it you know again do you have enough of that equipment does violia have that equipment or is it our equipment so all the equipment is owned by the city that that on the waste water side so we own all the trucks we own everything at the plant violia does not own anything um we

have uh we have one uh we have one grapple truck uh stco truck they're called right we have one of those right now in service uh one of them that's out of service awaiting repairs um so also the VOR trucks so the large trucks with the tanks on the back those can also be used to clean catch Basin out as well uh where we run into issues sometimes is uh

and you hear this from everybody in the city is short sta you know when you have a mainten maintenance division on the uh collection side uh that is comprised of seven people uh to deal with 6,000 catch basins 230 miles of uh sewer main cleaning uh 50 Mi of separated drainage uh as well as uh repair and catch Bas tops repair manhole covers uh all that it uh it's Manpower but you know I mean that just

keeps everything going keeps Everything clean and you know even with the algae we talk about uh the algae up in the pond but Westport Idan they line around our pond but we own 10 ft in from the shoreline and they build docks do we get paid do we get attacked on a a dock because if you're on the for Riverside and you have a dock you pay taxes that that's an additional thing just like a

shed you know and something else but they don't pay why I don't understand that and if they're using fertilizer on their lawns that is contaminating why are the Selectmen over in Sumer and Fall River you know meeting with them as well as intient to say you can't do this and you know this is this will be a fine or something because you're contaminating it who's responsible for doing that so

if you remember probably about three years ago we signed an intermunicipal agreement with uh both Westport and Idan um with the city of full River to uh work together to better the water quality within the South witha um you know I'm in regular contact with those other communities a lot of the Outreach that we do um we've been able to uh get grants for all the work that we've done so far on the

south R Tua as well as the council our side for the city Side as well as the council supported us with Opa funding so a lot of that education uh does you know is sent out to those other communities as well um you know the uh the public presentations that I do is is is um you know um the other communities do come um you know it is something that we're looking at uh

there are things called Dam districts uh so a whole entire District a watershed that flows down into one area uh or a dam you could do a dam District uh to be able to potentially um have everybody's share in the cost of What flows into that Watershed uh to try to better it there's a lot of different ways to be able to to look at that but but what would the agency Mr furland that says

you're using this type of fertilizer that you it's banned you cannot use it and you're using it what agency cites that individual or meets with that individual because I did at one of the meetings that you had if I'm not mistaken it was selectman valkor at the time in Westport and you know we were going to kind of team up I don't think he ran again um I think he

left did he didn't run again right he your brother again okay well thank you thank you for sharing that she was whispering yeah but he and I were going to team up and then he didn't run again but I just think that this is our pond and we are paying money to deal with this an algae bloom that other communities we have a municipal agreement inter Municipal agreement with them but they're not

giving us any money so we're trying to clean it and they keep contaminating it yeah like there needs to be something any suggestions on how we meet with them and and do something about this well so so again the intermunicipal agreement well Jim's got time on his hand I know you're busy I that's why I was like maybe maybe cherio go out there and talk to people well I don't mind doing

missionary work in the least bit but uh there is a general awareness right now on the south Pond uh as you know we're studying water quality issues in the South pond I think one of the things uh that you said is very very true and I think uh the Conservation Commission in the towns of Westport tton should be um given a a jingle and a joint meeting I think that would be a a very good idea

and uh what we'll do is um let's um let's explore having them come into a meeting of the water board and we'll talk about U all of those various issues that we share that we share an interest in and we can certainly invite them we U we do business with both of those communities we sell both of them water so and I think that people that live on the pond

want to make sure that well they are your biggest proponents for doing something in the towns it gets a little bit laborious as you get further away from things the source and then it's the South End doesn't want to I mean that's what I made westports um going um we've always envisioned Westport as a big customer um one end of the Town doesn't want to water system or the costs

involved in it the North End does that's always always happened in West yes my whole family lives in westwest though um I know that one um but I just wish we could have more manow to clean uh more of these uh catch basins but you know we can only do it what we have so I'm interested if you do have that meeting that they're going to come to a water

board meeting def I'd love to um know about it to to attend I'd be curious as to what some of their AB absolutely you know some way to work everybody together and not be in separate silos but work together you can accomplish so much more yep I yield Mr chairman thank you councel Council Dion yeah I just have one more question um lead in the water where are we with

that uh so l service removal um so the removal of the lead service from the water main into the house uh we uh completed at the end of the calendar year 23 we were just about uh were just under 500 lid Services replaced we required last calendar year to do a minimum of 400 um by the end of this calendar year we have to have a total of a thousand

so the original Lao had 400 600 600 then 400 every year thereafter um I went back to D and uh ret talked about that cuz I told them well last calendar year once I hit my 400 if I'm not going to get credit for this calendar year I'm going to you know slow down so that I only hit it and then CU 600 it's a lot to do in

one year so we're able to blend that all in together so by the end of this calendar year from the beginning we need to have a th000 removed uh which I feel that we're we're going to be able to do um the um ad Pini who's the contractor that had the contract last year is still working on once this year we have out to bid right now another contract for this

calendar year um and bids will be open uh not this Thursday uh next Thursday so um you know we are moving forward with that we're working with the wind Grant uh the OPA funding that uh that was provided to us as well as uh as well as the loan that we got through the srf program uh which had a 50 ended up being a 58% principal reduction so for forgiveness on the loan

yeah it was it was it was higher than what I even anticipated um so uh again we are reaching out right now one of our biggest things is verifying the location of the lead services to actually get into a house inspect and see whether there's a lead service did you find that there were fewer houses than you originally anticipated um because I I I believe before a certain date you would

anticipate it would be a lead service but yet some of them aren't they're um would it uh not is it steel uh copper copper copper typically or plastic if it's been replaced over the past couple of years um yeah so we've been having uh probably about 40 from the list of lead services that we had probably about 40% of those actually were Leed 60% of them were already replaced and we didn't need

to do them um through this whole entire process and through the revised leting copper rule that D and EPA put in place last year um by the end of this calendar year um we have to have a full inventory of all of the services is what the material is throughout the whole entire city so we already built that whole entire inventory and you either know what the material is or it's marked as

an unknown um if it's an unknown prior to 1978 then it's a unknown potential lead service so um essentially all those are going to have to be inspected because at the end of this calendar year DP and EPA are going to consider all those unknown possible Le as lead services so we're working through those now we're finding uh a lower return rate on those probably about 25% of those are actually LED uh

so we're having the contract to work to replace those uh the one thing that we're having issues with is getting responses from homeowners uh so we've done mailings we've done door hangers we've done door knockings we've done everything I have staff now in my office uh water department Clerks that are calling from 4 to 7: we're researching our database all phone numbers that we have four four I figured

4:00 at night to 7:00 would be the best time to be able to get somebody that's home so that we can schedule appointment if somebody doesn't know what their the makeup of their material is they can call the water department uh we can go through see if we have it in our records if not we want to schedule an appointment to be able to come out there offer an appointments multiple

days throughout the week uh at night during the week uh and then even on Saturdays as well so we're trying to make it accessible for the homeowners so that we can get in there this is going to be uh a big thing um we're going to have a website an interactive website that's coming out real soon where uh has all the properties throughout the city and what the material is homeowners will

be able to look at it and see what the uh what the material makeup is that feeds their house just like to going back historically at that time between 1871 and 1874 a great deal of study was put on as to what type of pipes should be used and the consensus of the day was lead it was it was found to be the healthiest form of piping for water Distribution Systems and Fall River

actually was in touch with Paris France along with other cities in Massachusetts as to what was the best solution to the public health problem and bringing portable water and Lead was found to be the the best possible fight and that's why today we're fighting 150 years of or at least 100 Years of infrastructure it's fascinating probably less expensive too actually more Le was yeah so there's always a factor of

course there's always a major factor but you know to do that film or a documentary that you're doing um reaching out to dery or to um BCC the students there love love a project like that yeah with Pamela M they love a project like that and then when we have meetings here and you know between like a finance committee meeting and a council meeting if there's time airing something like that rather than

just blank screen or the school committee when they have a meeting and they say in executive session rather than have that to have things like that or talk about the pipes or it it you know like it's nice public service announcement that you can kind of stick in there when people are watching yeah absolutely I don't know it's a good idea actually might work might do one for Led Services yeah yeah

that's Council Deion you still have the floor oh sorry no it's okay um sorry sorry I thought we were wrapping up sorry no that's fine I I'll I'll yield actually that Council far anything else you want to add no no no I just I'm really fascinated by Mr Terio fair enough uh I love history and he talks about 1954 when they open 9,000 trees yeah I was born 55 so just missed it it's a lot

of things to learn about the city of for and a lot of to be known gentlemen thank you very much I have no questions uh I think we've answered this resolution so I'll entertain a motion to leave we leave to withdraw second made and seconded all in favor I I motion to adjourn there nothing else in the agenda so motion to adjourn is made in seconded all in favor I N opposed the committee

on health and environmental Affairs is now adjourned

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